Europe Cup

Europe Cup XVI will be played in Denmark  from 28th to 31st August 2008

The England Teams selected are

Europe Cup XV was played at the Lynch West County Hotel, Ennis, County Clare, Ireland from the 21st to the 23rd of September 2006.

Europe Cup XV turned out to be a fantastic occasion for the England ladies as they took a clean sweep of all the titles, however the England men did not share the same good fortunes.

England Ladies Clare Bywaters & Trina Gulliver with the Overall Europe Cup Trophy and Medals

Clare & Trina moved steadily into the quarter finals of the pairs with wins against Belgium, Czech Republic, Norway and Denmark in topping group 1. This set up a match against Northern Ireland which they won 4 - 2, this was followed by a 4 - 0 win in the semi final against Wales.

In the final the girls looked well in control of the first leg against Scotland until Anne Kirk went out on 147 (highest finish by a lady in the Europe Cup). Scotland lead all the way then and Louise Hepburn missed a dart at the bull to take the match in the sixth leg, but the girls were not to be denied as they retained the title they had won in 2004 with a narrow 4 -3 victory.

The ladies pairs final was the first game played on finals day so when two games later the singles final was played both Clare and Trina had already tasted success before they played each other in a repeat of the 2005 World Cup Final. Clare took an early lead in the final and lead 2 - 1 before Trina took the next three legs to take the title in a great match.

In the semi finals Clare beat Anne Kirk (Scotland) 4 - 2 and Trina beat Julie Gore (Wales) 4 - 3. In the quarter finals it was a close cal for both girls as Trina beat Francis Hoenselaar (Netherlands) 4 - 3 - Francis had three darts in the last leg to knock Trina out. In her match against former Europe Cup Singles Champion, Denise Cassidy (Northern Ireland) Clare had to battle all the way after trailing 0 - 3 before taking the last four legs.

In the earlier round Clare beat Sabrina Sporle (Germany) and Zuzana Stepanova (Czech Republic) whilst Trina was beating Maud Jansson (Sweden) and  Anastasia Dobromyslova (Russia).

The best performance from the men came in the four man team event where they beat Belgium 9 - 5 and Iceland 9 - 1 before losing 5 - 9 to Northern Ireland, this meant they finished runners up in group 1 but still went into the quarter finals. The opponents in this match were Sweden and it provided a very impressive 9 - 4 to set up a semi-final clash against Scotland.

The semi-final was closely from start to finish with both teams leading at various stages, it was probably inevitable that the match was to finish up at 8 - 8 and needing a play off match between each Countries nominated players, it was Martin Adams v Gary Anderson (the current  top two BDO ranked players). Gary won the bull to throw first and lead for most of the leg until Martin hit a magnificent 180, unfortunately three missed darts  for Martin let Gary in to clinch a place in the final for Scotland.

England Men : Tony O'Shea, Shaun Greatbatch, Steve Farmer & Martin Adams having received their bronze medals

In the singles Steve Farmer had wins against Bela Balogh (Hungary), Miroslav Navratil (Czech Republic) and Mike Veitch (Scotland) before losing 2 - 4 to Robert Hughes (Wales) in the last sixteen. Tony O'Shea beat Anthony McCracken (Republic of Ireland) and Aegir Bjornsson (Iceland) before also losing in the last sixteen 3 - 4 against Daniel Larsson (Sweden). Shaun Greatbatch beat Thorgeir Gudmondsson (Iceland) before losing at the last 32 stage to Aodhagen O'Neill (Republic of Ireland) 1 - 4. Martin Adams went out in the last 64 with a 1 - 4 defeat to Paul Watton (Northern Ireland).

In the pairs Martin & Tony and Steve & Shaun both faced Finnish pairs in their first matches, they were playing on adjacent boards and sadly for our boys both matches went 4 - 3 to the Finns.

Listed below are all the medallists from Europe Cup XV

Ladies Singles Winner : Trina Gulliver

Ladies Pairs Winners : Trina Gulliver & Clare Bywaters

Mens Singles Winner : Mark Webster

Mens Pairs Winners : Paul Hanvidge & Paul McGimpsey

Mens Four Man & Overall Winners : Netherlands

Co Stompe, Jelle Klaasen, Niels De Ruiter & Vincent Van De Voort

The England Players, Officials & Supporters

The Europe Cup is staged bi-annually between the World Cup and below are the details of all players who have taken Gold Medals for England in previous Europe Cups since the first event was staged in 1978.