"There were quite a few vulgar comments from a lot of men" - Beau Greaves opens up on 'tough' reaction after coming out as gay

The ProTour can be a hard place to be. For Beau Greaves, she is adjusting to life well as she competes with the men for the PDC titles regularly on offer. Following her dominance in the Women's Series, the spotlight is firmly placed on her to continue developing to compete the best.

Since moving over to the PDC Tour, Greaves has continued to impress. She has made history a countless number of times, becoming the first woman to win a Players Championship title while recently breaking new ground on the European Tour.

Compared to the women's game, which she dominates, the men's is completely different. “Since playing against the men, it has felt like a job. I’ve had to come to terms with the fact I need to win a game to win some money,” she told The Observer.

She has got a lot of experience on the Pro Tour already this year, having played in every floor tournament, learning some valuable lessons. "You have to be really confident and back yourself,” Greaves said. “The second you start feeling, ‘Oh, I’m not ready for this game,’ or, ‘I feel a bit nervous,’ they just pounce on you, and they don’t care. You just have to fake it ‘til you make it a little bit and just never give up. You have to just make yourself better. You just have to win.”

For Greaves, it can feel like her against the world at times as she tries to make her own way into the sport. From competing on the Development Tour, she said playing “the cocky, arrogant young lads on the dev tour really helped my game."

Nevertheless, when she does not perform well: “The second I have a bad average, it’s, ‘She’s not good enough. She’s never been good enough.’ It’s definitely hard to deal with, but if I can do it, why can’t other women do it?”

Darts is a sport unique in that men and women can compete at the same level on the oche. Greaves has proven that to be the case, touted to be challenging for major titles sooner rather than later. However, this does not include all.

Noa-Lynn van Leuven was banned from competing in any PDC Women's Series events amid a ban on transgender women being implemented earlier this year.

“I have no bad feeling towards Noa at all,” Greaves commented. “Playing when all that was going on was tough because you don’t want to say anything too close to the bone and get called transphobic, which is not the case. We’re just fighting for women’s rights. I think the right decision was made, but I’d always respect her.”

There has been a lot of caution around women darters with that next step into the men's game. Greaves unveiled that many were not willing to make that step, despite the rewards on offer. “If you asked the majority of the ladies now, ‘Do you want to go and play against men on Sky Sports?’, they would say no. Sometimes it feels a little bit like an exhibition. I’ve had to stop thinking like that and actually try and think, ‘No, I am good enough.’ [Other female players] don’t believe in themselves maybe as much as they should do.”

Greaves has been in a relationship with Shan Reeves, whom she confirmed to be in a relationship with on Instagram. It was the first time publicly revealing that she is gay, with the duo meeting at a darts event a decade ago. They have since been together for four years and live with each other.

Unfortunately, Greaves has been met with some negative comments over this. “It’s been tough for me,” Greaves explained. “I never really came out, as such. People who knew me knew, but when we did post about it, there were quite a few vulgar comments from a lot of men."

It did not come as a surprise to the people around her. "When I told my mum and dad, they just said, ‘And?’ At the end of the day, she’s my biggest supporter. Why not embrace it for what it is and not be bothered about what people say?”

What makes Greaves rise to the top even more remarkable is that she overcame dartitis. This fate occurred for Reeves, wrecking her career as she has since started playing with her left hand.

It began for Greaves when she was playing with Reeves on facetime. Expecting the synonymous thud, Reeves instead heard the words "I'm stuck." When she finally let it go, it went out a nearby window. In a tournament that soon followed, it took the Englishwoman eight minutes to throw three darts.

“Why did she carry on playing? I’d just give up," Reeves remarked. Greaves did consider quitting, starting a Level One NVQ in painting and decorating and mulling over a career in window cleaning like her dad.

Since then, she has learned to live with it and deals with it much better. “The other players don’t have any thoughts in their head,” she stated. “You just have to ignore it and switch your brain off sometimes. And that’s what I taught myself to do—just stop thinking about it.”

From dartitis to being on a trajectory to match the big guns on the PDC Tour in the near future. When asked about winning the PDC World Darts Championship, Greaves said, “That would be pretty special, wouldn’t it?”

She still needs that first win, following in the footsteps of Fallon Sherrock. However, she wants to do it for herself. “I don’t really want to look at myself as a woman to go and win on Ally Pally. I just want to do it for my ranking and do really well. I want to do it just because I’m part of the professional circuit.”