THE St Helens Darts academy which started with eight players and two boards 18 months ago, now has a whopping 95 youngsters on its books.

Now based at Our Lady's, on Fleet Lane in Parr, the academy boast seven match boards and four for practice.

And the youngsters have been flocking with darters, aged 6-18, playing there on Mondays 6-9pm.

On Wednesday night the age group is a bit older, 14-23,and it is a fast and furious, but very intense practice night.

A180 Darts' Karl Holden, who set up the academy, has been delighted with the response.

And it he is confident the next generation of players to follow in the footsteps of Dave Chisnall, Stephen Bunton, Alan Tabern and Michael Smith will come from these early years on the oche in the Parr club.

Holden said: “We now have seven county youth players, two PDC Youth players, plus 13 playing in for club teams.

“On top of that 18-year-old Peter Fisher has made the last 16 and two 3rd Rounds in the PDC Youths.”

It is not simply about producing great dart players, and Holden has pointed out that the children have developed their social skills and seen their maths improve.

“We have kids who went from set five to set one in maths and most of it down to their love of darts.

“Darts is good for them, their maths and the respect they have to learn, things like shaking hands with the opposition.

“The kids are all shown how to work a dartboard and now mark the games themselves,” he said.

The turnouts have been consistently good — last week there was 59 in attendance.

And there is no shortage of dedication.

Holden explains: “One of our players is a season ticket holder for Manchester City - but when they played Liverpool the other week he said, ‘I cant go, I’ve got to play darts’.

“We’ve got an 11 year old who has hit over 200 180s so he has now stopped counting them.

“Monday is hectic - it is non stop darts but they are all well behaved.

“All 11 boards are in use. The ones that are not playing are practising.

“They are constantly improving and getting better.

“We are not there to make money, we charge them £2 and they get their tea for that.

“We have all walks of life and backgrounds here.

“Although I have got a lot of help down there I could do with more to get it going a bit further.”

Elite PDC player Michael Smith is a regular at the Academy, with Bunting sand Chisnall both visiting too.

Women’s world champion Lisa Ashton has also been down and played 20 legs of darts.

It is not just boys and one of the academy’s best players is 17-year-old girl Danni Platt from Toll Barr who Holden ranks as in top six in England in the under 18 girls category.

She is 17 and she has come on a treat.

Holden said: “There are seven girls here now.

“Danni used to be ‘the girl that could beat the lads’, but there’s none of them speak like that now.

“We had two lads who quit because they didn’t like losing to a girl.

“I told them they would never make a dart player with that attitude.

“The lads now are not scared of playing Danni - they want to beat her because she is one of the best players.

“Danni has a a good future in darts.

“We have had a lot of players come through St Helens.

“Two players had to drop out of the town’s senior Super League team the other week in the game against Little Hulton - so we gave them a couple of our kids.

“Michael Gallagher is only 12 but he only went and won 4-0!

“On top of the that Joe Gardam won 4-2 with a 57 average.

“For those two to step in and both win I was very proud.”

Players from the academy are now going off to play in pub teams.

“It is sensible and they are learning social skills.

“They don’t drink or smoke, and they all behave and I think this will bring them on in life.

“It doesn’t make things worse for them, that’s for sure. I’d rather them be in a pub playing darts than walking around the streets.”