Keith Deller (born 24 December 1959 in
IpswichIpswich is a non-metropolitan district and the county town of Suffolk, England on the estuary of the River Orwell. Nearby towns are Felixstowe in Suffolk and Harwich and Colchester in Essex...
) is an English
dartsDarts is a form of sport where darts are thrown at a circular target hung on a wall. Though various different boards and games have been used in the past, the term 'darts' usually now refers to a standardized game involving a specific board design and set of rules...
player, who won the Embassy
World Professional Darts ChampionshipThe World Professional Darts Championship is the most important tournament in the darts calendar. Originally held as an annual event between 1978 and 1993, players then broke off into two separate organisations after a controversial split in the game...
in 1983. He was the youngest player and the first qualifier ever to win the championship. Dutch player
Jelle KlaasenJelle Klaasen is the youngest darts player ever to win the World Darts Championship. His nickname is The Matador. He lives in Breda, North Brabant, Netherlands...
took his record as youngest ever winner in 2006.
Deller's victory over
Eric BristowEric Bristow MBE is a British darts player, whose skill at the game in the 1980s helped turn it into a worldwide spectator sport.- Early career :...
in the tournament by 6 sets to 5 was probably the biggest upset in the history of the championship.
Keith Deller (born 24 December 1959 in
IpswichIpswich is a non-metropolitan district and the county town of Suffolk, England on the estuary of the River Orwell. Nearby towns are Felixstowe in Suffolk and Harwich and Colchester in Essex...
) is an English
dartsDarts is a form of sport where darts are thrown at a circular target hung on a wall. Though various different boards and games have been used in the past, the term 'darts' usually now refers to a standardized game involving a specific board design and set of rules...
player, who won the Embassy
World Professional Darts ChampionshipThe World Professional Darts Championship is the most important tournament in the darts calendar. Originally held as an annual event between 1978 and 1993, players then broke off into two separate organisations after a controversial split in the game...
in 1983. He was the youngest player and the first qualifier ever to win the championship. Dutch player
Jelle KlaasenJelle Klaasen is the youngest darts player ever to win the World Darts Championship. His nickname is The Matador. He lives in Breda, North Brabant, Netherlands...
took his record as youngest ever winner in 2006.
Deller's victory over
Eric BristowEric Bristow MBE is a British darts player, whose skill at the game in the 1980s helped turn it into a worldwide spectator sport.- Early career :...
in the tournament by 6 sets to 5 was probably the biggest upset in the history of the championship. He also beat world number 3,
John LoweJohn Lowe is an English darts player who was one of the main competitors who made darts such a huge spectator sport in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the United Kingdom.-Biography:...
in the quarter finals and defending champion and world number 2,
Jocky WilsonJohn Thomas Wilson better known as "Jocky" Wilson, is a former Scottish darts champion. He retired from the game in 1995.Wilson was twice World professional Darts Champion in 1982 and 1989...
in the semi-final to become the only player in history to defeat the world's top three ranked players in the World Championship. The champion's prize money in 1983 was £8,000.
His checkout of 138 to clinch the trophy is amongst the most memorable in darting history.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/specials/world_darts_championship_2002/1706853.stm Bristow had left himself 50 to stay in the match, but decided to throw for single 18 to leave double 16 instead of a more difficult attempt at the bullseye. Deller then hit treble 20, treble 18, double 12 for the title and even to this day commentators often refer to 138 as the "Deller checkout" if a player is left with that score.
Despite a meteoric rise to World Champion, his career results failed to maintain that level. On the defence of his world title he lost in the first round to
Nicky VirachkulNicky Virachkul was a professional darts player who competed in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. He competed in the third WDF World Cup darts tournament in 1979 and won the singles title...
and he only won three further matches in the Embassy World Championship in subsequent years. He did win the British Professional Championship in 1987, but generally his world ranking continued to fall and he even failed to qualify for the World Championship between 1989 and 1993.
Deller was one of the players who broke away from the
British Darts OrganisationThe British Darts Organisation, or the BDO for short, is a darts organisation.It was founded on 7 January 1973 by Olly Croft, OBE in the front room of his home in Muswell Hill...
in 1992 and joined the WDC, now the
PDCThe Professional Darts Corporation is a professional darts organisation, established in the United Kingdom during 1992, when a group of leading professional players split from the officially-recognised British Darts Organisation...
. This saw him gain some more television exposure and he did produce a few resurgent performances to reach the semi finals of the 1998 PDC World Championship and also the semi finals of the 1998 PDC World Matchplay. Deller dropped out of the top 32 of the PDC's World Rankings around 2005 and therefore has to attempt to qualify for their major tournaments - which he failed to do for the 2006, 2007 and 2008 PDC World Championships. He now competes much less on the circuit including around half-a-dozen UK Open Regional events during 2007, preferring to perform in more lucrative exhibition matches with fellow legend players such as Bristow and Lowe.
Deller's name has been in the record books on a couple of occasions. He held the
Guinness World RecordGuinness World Records, known until 2000 as The Guinness Book of Records , is a reference book published annually, containing an internationally recognised...
for the fastest 3 legs of 301 in 97 seconds. On October 13, 1984 he was on the wrong end of a piece of darting history when Lowe hit the first-ever televised
nine-dart finishA nine dart finish is the ultimate checkout in the game of darts, constituting a perfect game. It is notoriously difficult to achieve, even by the game's top professionals...
against him in the quarter-finals of the MFI World Matchplay. He became the first player in history to achieve a match average of 100 in the 1985 World Championship quarter-finals; he did, however, lose the game to Lowe.
Deller has for many years been part of the
Sky SportsSky Sports is the brand name for a group of sports-oriented television channels operated by the UK and Ireland's main satellite pay-TV company, British Sky Broadcasting. Sky Sports is the dominant subscription television sports brand in the United Kingdom and Ireland...
broadcasting team acting as a "spotter" for the cameras. His knowledge of the players and scoring shots helps the director and cameramen anticipate where the next dart will be thrown.
Deller is married to Kim and they have two children.
Unified
- 1983 Champion
- 1984 Last 32 lost to Nicky Virachkul
Nicky Virachkul was a professional darts player who competed in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. He competed in the third WDF World Cup darts tournament in 1979 and won the singles title...
1-2
- 1985 Quarter Final lost to John Lowe
John Lowe is an English darts player who was one of the main competitors who made darts such a huge spectator sport in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the United Kingdom.-Biography:...
2-4
- 1986 Last 16 lost to Alan Glazier
Alan Glazier is a retired English darts player. He used the nickname "The Ton Machine" and was noted for his all-black outfits....
1-3
- 1987 Last 32 lost to Brian Cairns 0-3
- 1988 Last 32 lost to John Lowe 1-3
PDC
- 1994 Last 24 Group lost to Steve Brown
Steve Brown is an English-born American darts player who had the majority of his success during the 1990s when he finished third at the inaugural Professional Darts Corporation's version of the World Championship in 1994 - after the majority of top players decided to separate from the British...
1-3 & Kevin SpiolekKevin Spiolek is an English darts player who played during the 1980s and 1990s. He made a brief return to form in 2006 when qualifying to play in the PDC World Darts Championship....
1-3
- 1995 Last 24 Group lost to Larry Butler
Larry Butler is an American darts player, who was the winner of the 1994 PDC World Matchplay Darts Championship. This success made him the first, and so far only American player to have won a major darts tournament in Europe....
2-3 & Kevin Spiolek 1-3
- 1996 Quarter Final lost to Phil Taylor
Philip Douglas "Phil" Taylor is an English darts player. Nicknamed The Power, he has won 52 major tournaments, which includes 14 world championships, more than any other player in the history of the sport. He has been ranked World Number One since June 2008 and has had eight different spells at...
0-4
- 1997 Quarter Final lost to Phil Taylor 1-5
- 1998 Semi Final lost to Dennis Priestley
Dennis Priestley is a two-time World Darts Champion and the first player to win both BDO and WDC World Championship Crowns, in 1991 and 1994 respectively. He is nicknamed "The Menace", in relation to the Dennis the Menace cartoons, and reflects this by wearing red and black, and using red and...
1-5 (lost 3rd place match to Rod HarringtonRod Harrington is a former English darts player. He used the nickname The Prince of Style for his matches, often wearing a suit and waistcoast for his games...
1-4)
- 1999 Last 32 lost to Bob Anderson
Robert Charles "Bob" Anderson is a former world darts champion. He was ranked as world number one for over three years in the late 1980s. Nicknamed The Limestone Cowboy, he lives in Clevedon in Somerset.-Before Darts:Anderson threw his first darts maximum at the age of just five...
2-3
- 2000 Last 16 lost to John Lowe 1-3
- 2001 Quarter Final lost to Phil Taylor 0-4
- 2002 Last 32 lost to Rod Harrington 3-4
- 2003 Last 32 lost to Richie Burnett
Richie Burnett is a Welsh darts player who was the 1995 World Darts Champion and currently plays in Professional Darts Corporation events. His nickname is The Prince of Wales.-BDO career:...
3-4
- 2004 Last 16 lost to Peter Manley
Peter David Manley is a darts player who plays in the Professional Darts Corporation. He is nicknamed One Dart as he is known for hitting doubles with his first dart...
2-4
- 2005 Last 40 lost to Wayne Jones
Wayne Alan Jones is an English darts player who plays in Professional Darts Corporation tournaments. He uses the nickname The Wanderer for his matches....
1-3
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