England’s Lisa Ashton and Belgium’s Geert de Vos became the 2015 BDO World Trophy Champions after another superb day of darts at EventCity in Manchester.  Proving that darts really is a global sport, the runners-up – Anastasia Dobromyslova (Russia) and Jeffrey de Graaf (Netherlands) – ensured that four different nations were represented on the final stage. 

Finals day commenced with a thrilling quarter-final tussle between Wayne Warren and Jeff Smith.  Welshman Warren raced into a 5-1 lead, only for Smith to pull it back to within a leg.  A pair of 18-darters put Warren just one leg from victory, but the Canadian wasn’t done, and Smith took the last four legs to earn his second major semi-final spot of the year.

Jeffrey de Graaf also survived an early scare to reach the semis, as Stefaan Deprez took an early 3-1 lead.  The Belgian couldn’t maintain the form, and de Graaf then won five legs in a row to make it 6-3 in his favor.  The next four legs were shared, but it was enough to see de Graaf home.

Deprez’s fellow countryman Geert de Vos went one better, and put an end to the hopes of the other remaining Dutchman, Wesley Harms.  The first four legs were shared, but a couple of well-timed breaks of throw gave de Vos the edge, and he held on to win 8-5.  Finally, Mark McGeeney won a high-quality all-English clash against Glen Durrant.  “Duzza” never recovered from going 4-0 down, and McGeeney captured the win in twelve legs.

The women’s semi-final lineup was not quite as cosmopolitan as the men’s, with three English girls and a lone Russian.  However, Anastasia Dobromyslova made sure that the final wan’t going to be an all-English affair, and battled to a 6-3 victory over young Fallon Sherrock.  The second semi-final saw Deta Hedman post the highest average of the round, with 27.21. but as we know, averages don’t win matches – doubles do.  Not that Deta did anything wrong there, but a brilliant spell of finishing from both players actually saw Ashton take the initiative at a crucial stage of the game.  A beautiful 112 out from Hedman (while her opponent sat on 40) left her just one leg down at 4-3. but Ashton struck back immediately with two big outs of her own (112 and 120) to set her up for an eventual 6-3 triumph.

Both men’s semi-finals were close.  Jeff Smith and Jeffrey de Graaf were locked together at 7-7 before the Dutchman squeezed home by winning the next two, and Geert de Vos and Mark McGeeney was even tighter, with de Vos getting the verdict 9-8.  With just .01 of a point separating the two, it really was close, and de Vos captured five of the last six legs (including the last three) to reach the final.

For the women’s glory, three-time World Champ Dobromyslova took on two-time – and reigning – World Champ Ashton.  Thanks to some more clinical finishing (109 and 116), Ashton stormed into a 6-2 lead, and despite Dobromyslova pulling back to 6-5, Lisa Ashton pocketed her second major of 2015.

Neither Geert de Vos nor Jeffrey de Graaf had the records that the two women had, so we were going to see the emergence of a new winner.  In a match that kept swinging one way, then the other, de Vos yet again did it the hard way.  Down 8-4, the Belgian incredibly won six of the last seven legs to get his name on the BDO World Trophy!

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