1980 Embassy World Darts Championship
Tournament information
Dates	2–9 February 1980
Venue	Jollees Cabaret Club[1]
Location	Stoke-on-Trent
Country	England
Organisation(s)	BDO
Format	Sets Final – best of 9
Prize fund	£15,000
Winner's share	£4,500
High checkout	161 Tony Sontag 161 Terry O'Dea
Champion(s)
Eric Bristow[2]
«1979 1981»

The 1980 Embassy World Darts Championship was the third year that the British Darts Organisation had staged a world championship. Again the field was 24 players, with the top seeds receiving a bye to the last 16 stage. For the second successive year the tournament was staged at Jollees Cabaret Club in Stoke-on-Trent.

Defending champion John Lowe, who had released a book The Lowe Profile just before the event suffered a surprise defeat 0–2 to Cliff Lazarenko saying afterwards "If you miss your doubles in this one, you must expect to go out." Eric Bristow was then immediately installed as favourite to win the event and would meet another flamboyant character of the game in the final – Bobby George.

George, who was not invited to the qualifiers the previous year appeared in a sequined shirt and when arriving on the stage was presented with a candelabra to complete a Liberace effect. He also made the early running in the final leading 1–0, 2–1 and 3–2. The first six sets all went to a deciding leg until Bristow won the seventh 3–1 to establish a 4–3 set lead. In the next set at 2–2 in legs, George had a golden opportunity to level the match and take it to a decider, but bust his score and nonchalantly threw his third dart into the board before putting his darts into his top pocket in anticipation of Bristow checking out to win the title. Bristow did so.

Bristow later said: "This was the final that changed the game of darts forever. Before that the audiences were always quite subdued, there was never really a buzz around the place, but when Bobby and I played in that final every member of the audience got involved. Everybody quite simply was going mad. It was a pit of noise. He had his fans, I had mine and both wanted to out-shout each other.^[3]

Seeds

1. John Lowe
2. Eric Bristow
3. Tony Brown
4. Leighton Rees
5. Bobby George
6. Nicky Virachkul
7. Jocky Wilson
8. Ceri Morgan

Prize money

The prize fund was £15,000.

Champion: £4,500

Runner-Up: £2,000

3rd Place: £500

Semi-Finalists (2): £1,000

Quarter-Finalists (4): £500

Last 16 (8): £300

Last 24 (8): £200

Results

	First round (best of 3 sets) 2–3 February					Second round (best of 3 sets) 4–6 February					Quarter-finals (best of 5 sets) 6–7 February					Semi-finals (best of 7 sets) 8 February					Final (best of 9 sets) 9 February
						1	John Lowe 86.43	0
	Paul Gosling 77.79		0				Cliff Lazarenko 89.04	2
												Cliff Lazarenko 86.79	3
	Cliff Lazarenko 81.40		2
											8	Ceri Morgan 86.70	1
						8	Ceri Morgan 76.38	2
	Allan Hogg 72.21		1				Alan Grant 71.25	0
																	Cliff Lazarenko 84.27	1
	Alan Grant 77.19		2
																5	Bobby George 79.89	4
						5	Bobby George 91.20	2
	Len Heard 76.17		0				Dave Whitcombe 84.15	0
											5	Bobby George 75.39	3
	Dave Whitcombe 81.99		2
											4	Leighton Rees 73.59	1
						4	Leighton Rees 78.78	2
	Rab Smith 85.02		1				Tony Sontag 81.93	0
																					5	Bobby George 86.49	3
	Tony Sontag 84.151		2
																					2	Eric Bristow 88.11	5
						2	Eric Bristow 79.89	2
	Alan Glazier 69.33		0				Tony Clark 79.23	0
											2	Eric Bristow 81.90	3
	Tony Clark 78.45		2
											7	Jocky Wilson 78.90	0
						7	Jocky Wilson 82.11	2
	Conrad Daniels 77.01		0				Doug McCarthy 79.14	0
																2	Eric Bristow 86.22	4
	Doug McCarthy 74.25		2
																3	Tony Brown 86.28	3
						6	Nicky Virachkul 76.56	0
	Stefan Lord 78.39		1				Bill Lennard 82.80	2
												Bill Lennard 79.80	0
	Bill Lennard 75.57		2
											3	Tony Brown 84.30	3
						3	Tony Brown 82.50	2
	Eric MacLean 81.72		1				Terry O'Dea 76.77	0
	Terry O'Dea 82.29		2

3rd place match (best of 3 sets) Cliff Lazarenko 88.02 0 – 2 Tony Brown 99.24

References