SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
Before the World Darts Championships kicked off in December, we caught up with Tony Kenny to chat about William Hill and their plans for sponsoring the show-piece event. Fast forward a few weeks and with the darting hysteria dying just a little, SBC spoke with him again to find out how it all went.
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SBC: Tony, William Hill must be delighted at the interest and excitement generated by the quality of the darts?
TK: I loved the whole event – the atmosphere, the darts and the drama is like no other sporting event I’ve ever attended.
SBC: How successful was the William Hill darts iOS App and did it face any challenges that you weren’t expecting?
TK: We showcased the app at Ally Pally and it went down really well. We’re constantly evolving the app and the number of markets available on it.
SBC: In terms of marketing, are there any promotions that you ran that you’d be keen to avoid next time around?
TK: Everything went to plan. We’ll have plenty more surprises in store next year though!
SBC: Did you manage to surpass that £10 million on bets taken for the tournament?
TK: Yes. We’re just collating all of the international figures but we’re way up on last year.
SBC: Besides the usual match winner and outright markets, were there any markets that received a surprising amount of bets?
TK: The nine-darter markets market were really popular. The surprise market was ‘who will have the best three-dart average of the session’ betting. I suppose for a punter to be able to get Michael van Gerwen or Phil Taylor at odds against during any session of the tournament is a major attraction.
SBC: And finally, what is your favourite memory of what was a great event?
TK: Gary Anderson’s nine-darter in the semi-finals was a highlight, but Dmitri van den Bergh’s walk-on in the second round – I’ve never seen anything like that before!
Tony Kenny, Head of Sponsorship and PR
