At the oche: Beau Greaves
(Picture: Taylor Lanning/PDC)First comes the Magpie, then the German Giant and, most likely, the Machine after that.
But, before taking one foot on the oche, Beau Greaves can surely lay claim to eclipsing the rest of the PDC World Darts Championship field in the nickname stakes.
Her Beau ’n’ Arrow moniker was created by a friend of her father’s from her local pub, The Plough in Balby, near Doncaster, and it is one that has stuck.
The 18-year-old is a breath of fresh air. Where Fallon Sherrock helped to break the glass ceiling with her wins against male players at the Worlds, Greaves threatens to shatter it still further.
In women’s events, she is unbeaten in 52 matches and did not drop a leg at her most recent tournament win.
This week, she makes her World Championship debut against her male counterparts, starting with William ‘the Magpie’ O’Connor, so-called for his obsession back in Limerick in the early days for shiny trophies.
All the more impressive is that for two years prior to this season, Greaves was beset by ‘dartitis’, something that still remains in the back of her mind. But, amid it all, she remains remarkably laidback and unflashy.
Of her nickname, she says: “It was one of my dad’s mates who used to play in the bar with us. He came down [to our house] one day, sat on the sofa and said I’ve got a nickname for Beau… it’s Beau ‘n’ Arrow.
“I’ve never really bothered with it or had it on my shirt, it’s just stuck. There’s no getting away from it. I’m not one for a nickname on my shirt, but it’s not a bad one.”
She has had what she describes as the best year of her career, a far cry from just before the Covid pandemic at a PDC event when things started to feel off. Even now, she cannot fully describe her symptoms.
“Before I even played, I didn’t want to be there [on the oche]” she recalled. “I said to my dad, ‘Something doesn’t feel right’. I was letting the darts go and there was no confidence.
“I was just hoping I was going to hit stuff. I honestly thought I was going to miss the board.
“I’d played darts for six years then and it felt like I’d just started. Once it happened once, it happened again and again, and it got worse and worse. I just want to shy away from it.”
And so she did, packing up her darts and instead focusing on her NVQ Level One in painting and decorating. But eating away at her was her own unrequited love for the sport and a supportive sister nagging her to get back to the board.
From there, her darts and her results have been on song, although the dartitis still bubbles under the surface. “When I describe it to people it’s sort of like a feeling like you sort of know it’s there,” she said.
“It’s really weird to explain to someone who hasn’t had it. There’s ways around it and stuff. It just depends how you deal with it.”
Had she not gone down the route of a darts return, painting may have been the way forward or else her other unlikely passion — cleaning windows. “My dad used to have a window round and I used to love it,” she said. “If I wasn’t doing darts, I probably would have liked to have done his round all the time. The only thing I loved as much as darts was cleaning windows.”
The way she is playing right now, the windows in the neighbouring vicinity of her Doncaster home will remain uncleaned by her.
From the age of 10, darts has always been the primary passion, first inspired by her brother Taylor, who previously played on the PDC development tour. He would always beat her at darts but that gradually changed. Some of her happiest times would be when playing down the pub with him, her dad, uncle, grandad and sometimes cousins.
Taylor, as well as mum and dad, will be in the crowd at the Ally Pally. It is comfortably the biggest stage on which Greaves has ever played and she has no idea if she will be able to hear her family amid the cacophony of noise.
As for daring to dream of a Sherrock-esque run, that is not in her make-up. “I’ll leave my mum and dad to do that stuff,” she said.
But going into the Worlds, she appears to have the perfect attitude. “When I first started playing darts, my dad always said to me, ‘The minute you stop enjoying it, just stop playing’,” she said.
“That’s the best way. You play your best darts. I’m 18 and lucky to have the life I do. I don’t see why I should ruin good occasions like this by being nervous.”
