Jocky Wilson RIP

I hope our American readers forgive us for honouring one of Britain's greatest ever sportsman but it was very sad on the weekend to hear of Scottish darts player Jocky Wilson pass away at the age of 62.

"Stocky Jocky on the oche" was a legend. All of his teeth had fallen out by the time he was 28 apparently as a result of never cleaning them combined with his love of sweets and coke with his vodka (my American friends will love that little bit of info) and during a match he would easily smoke through a packet of cigarettes.

Jocky, however, came from another time, before anyone had thought of marketing the sport. He would have seven or eight vodkas before a match to settle his nerves and then move on to the pints. Once, he fell off the stage when an opponent offered him a handshake at the end of a contest.

Wilson's great battles with the Englishman Eric Bristow were watched by millions on television, but broadcasters soon found that negative publicity attracted by the hard-drinking, chain-smoking participants of this noble sport was too much for them to bear. "If darts comes off TV for good," Wilson said, "I'm off to Japan to take up sumo wrestling."Darts did not come off television, but drinking and smoking on stage were banned, and instead of a new life in Japan, Wilson retreated to his one-bedroom council flat in Kirkcaldy, where he lived out the rest of his life as a virtual recluse before the lung disease which was clearly a result of his punishingly unhealthy lifestyle finally claimed him.

Very sad. Jocky was from a time when the sporting world was a different, if more colourful place.

You Tube clip.