Bristow back in old routine

He may barely have thrown a dart in anger this century but Eric Bristow still calls the shots.

With the attention of the darting world firmly focused on Purfleet this Sunday, when rival world champions Phil Taylor and Andy Fordham go head-to-head in the £100,000 PartyPoker.com Showdown, it's the Crafty Cockney who threatens to steal the show.

The 47-year-old last competed on our TV screens five years ago, when he lost in the first round of the World Championship, but his reappearance on the undercard of Sunday's boxing-style 'unification bout', when he takes on former sparring partner John Lowe, is sure to be a highlight.

But although Bristow has been out of the limelight for a while, the man who became the game's first real superstar in the 1980s has never really been away.

He travels the world for Sky, providing analysis at tournaments and working as a 'spotter' for its cameramen, telling them where a player is going to throw the next dart during a game.

Bristow is back playing the exhibition circuit after suffering a bout of 'dartitis' - a condition, similar to the yips in golf, which prevents the sufferer from releasing the dart. He is none the wiser as to what causes the ailment.

"I don't know what it's all about," he said. "Bloody weird it is. Over time your hand just gets slower and slower and then you can't throw at all. Even practising, I had it. The hand wouldn't let go."

For a man who once boasted of having "two bowls of confidence for breakfast", the ailment was particularly galling.