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| |  Friday, 12 January, 2001, 02:35 GMT Walton crushes Pusa threat Walton flights in another magic arrow during his win John `Boy' Walton's love affair with the Lakeside continued on Thursday when he stormed into the Embassy World Championship semi-finals with a 5-0 rout of Finland's Marko Pusa. The contest, between two unseeded players, was so one-sided that Walton won 14 successive legs before his opponent finally got off the mark. Sheffield 39-year-old Walton won the World Masters on the same stage last month and had again showed his liking for the Frimley Green venue with impressive victories over Ritchie Davies and world number one Mervyn King. Those wins established him as favourite to beat Pusa - but nobody could have predicted just how emphatic Walton's dominance would be.
After taking the opening set he found himself with a glorious chance of a nine-dart finish in the second. It was only on the penultimate dart that Walton's hopes of the �50,000 bonus floundered, but he shrugged off the disappointment and reached the interval 4-0 up in sets with Pusa looking an increasingly sorry figure.
The crowd, normally so vociferous, were clearly sympathising with the frozen Finn as the arena was the quietest it had been all week, and things got worse for the 23-year-old from Hollala as soon as the match resumed. A 138 checkout put Walton one leg from victory - but suddenly his rival found some of the form which enabled him to achieve a magnificent 33.77 average against Jez Porter in the second round. Pusa hit his first 180 in the 15th leg and went on to slot a double six to huge applause from the spectators.
He then finished on the same double for a 126 checkout in the next leg to suggest some sort of recovery was on the cards. But although Pusa had darts to win the set in the next leg, he could not convert them and Walton completed a resounding triumph to reach the last four on only his second Embassy appearance. In the the first women's World Championship final, world number one Trina Gulliver beat another English player, Mandy Solomons, 2-1. | |
See also:  11 Jan 01 | World Darts Championship 10 Jan 01 | World Darts Championship 11 Jan 01 | World Darts Championship Top World Darts Championship stories now: Links to more World Darts Championship stories are at the foot of the page. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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