On the 13 August, 1960, the professional darts player Phil [The Power] Taylor, was born in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. Taylor left school at the age of 16, and after holding a few jobs he spent most of his early working days making ceramic toilet roll handles. Although he liked to play darts and football as a child, he never took up the game seriously until he moved into a terraced house in Burslem, near to Eric Bristow’s pub ‘The Crafty Cockney’.

His wife Yvonne bought him a set of darts for his birthday and he started playing regularly, occasionally at Bristow’s pub. By 1986 he was selected for the county team and playing at Super League level.

Bristow sponsored Taylor by loaning him £10,000 to help him get started as a professional darts player, to take care of his family and on condition he give up his job in the ceramic industry.

Taylor won 214 professional tournaments, including a record 85 major titles and a record 16 World Championships, 8 consecutively from 1995 to 2002, and reached 14 consecutive finals from 1994 to 2007. He has won 70 PDC Pro Tour events, comprising 45 Players Championship events, 21 UK Open Qualifiers and 4 European Tour events. This was a record until Michael van Gerwen surpassed it in February 2019.

Taylor won the PDC Player of the Year award six times (2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012) and has twice been nominated for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, in 2006 and 2010, finishing as runner-up in the latter. He was also the first person to hit two nine-dart finishes in one match, in the 2010 Premier League Darts final against James Wade. He hit a record 11 televised nine-dart finishes, out of a total of 22 overall.

Taylor played in competitions organised by the British Darts Organisation [BDO] until 1993, when amidst growing disenchantment, he was among 16 top players who broke away to form their own organisation, the World Darts Council, now known as the Professional Darts Corporation.

Taylor confirmed his retirement from professional darts just before the final of the 2018 World Championship, but remains active on the exhibition circuit.

In 1993, Taylor became the landlord at the Cricketers Arms in Newcastle-under-Lyme.  

13 August, 2019