CARLOW’S STEVE LENNON pulled off a sensational comeback as he came from two sets and a break down to stun Owen Bates at the PDC World Darts Championship.
Lennon was not only staring a first-round exit in the face, but the loss of his tour card as well, as Bates won the opening two sets at the Alexandra Palace on Wednesday afternoon.
After Lennon squandered six darts to hold his throw in the opening leg of the third, the writing appeared to be on the wall.
But in a remarkable turn of fortune, he bounced back to reel off nine of the next 11 legs, clinching a most unlikely win and a second-round showdown with Jonny Clayton.
“That win meant a lot to me,” a delighted Lennon said as he revealed that he had considered withdrawing from the tournament.
“I haven’t been in a good place mentally coming into this, so I didn’t know what to expect at all form-wise.
“The stage is a hard place to be when you’re not in the right headspace.
“I think when I was two sets to nil down, I kind of relaxed a bit. That’s the beauty of the sets and legs format. I didn’t look at the overall scoreline, I was just treating it as if it was nil-all and forgot about the last two sets.
“I think a bit of experience paid off in the end.”
Lennon returns to the oche in Saturday’s afternoon session for his round two clash against ninth seed Clayton.
There was double delight for the Irish at the Ally Pally as Limerick’s Willie O’Connor comfortably dispatched Bhav Patel of India 3-0.
O’Connor didn’t drop a single leg as he breezed through with a scoring average of 98.74 to set up a meeting with 2023 quarter-finalist Chris Dobey on Friday night.
“I just played my own game,” he said afterwards. “When I saw those opportunities when he had a couple of silly scores, I just jumped on them and got over the line.”
Asked to assess his season as a whole, O’Connor said: “Poor enough, to be honest about it, but we can put it right now at the end of the year, so on to the next one.”
Elsewhere in Wednesday’s afternoon session, there were wins for Radek Szaganski and Ross Smith, while on Wednesday night, all eyes will be on two-time champion Peter Wright when he takes on Jim Williams for a place in round three.
