How CoLDA Started - Part 1
Written by Roger a.k.a The Pearly King
In Memory of Colin Butler and Sean Cain
The players of today join The City of London Darts Association Singles League in the knowledge that it is a well-established and efficiently run organisation, with a fine reputation that easily attracts people. But how did CoLDA get into the position it now holds within the sport? The path to becoming a widely known and hugely popular League wasn’t always a smooth one, and there were many difficult challenges which had to be overcome in those early, pioneering days which both defined and laid the solid groundwork for what is now a very successful League. Without this, CoLDA would not have had the strong foundations on which to build (and continues to build). Join me now as I take you through the history of The City of London Darts Association!
The origins of CoLDA can be traced to a cold, Friday evening in January 2011. The location, the Porters Lodge, Arthur Street, near Monument Tube Station. Before I continue with the main story, it would be remiss of me not to say how, and why, the Porters eventually became the first home of CoLDA.
In 2009, the Porters Lodge was a nondescript, scruffy boozer that people barely noticed and rarely ventured into. Its location was the basement of a tired office building, one which the owners had been trying for some time to demolish in order to build a newer, more attractive one in its place. The Corporation of London continually rejected the plans, citing other new buildings which had lots of dormant office space. So why give permission to build yet one more, that may remain largely vacant?
There was a solitary dartboard in the pub, above a disused fireplace and which likely had been there for many years almost as decoration rather than something that would be utilised regularly for play. The pub manager at the time, Rob Madigan, was wondering how he could attract customers on a more regular basis other than the annual Sunday when the London Marathon route took it directly past the pub at around the 23-mile marker.
Madigan had played darts in the City before, initially (for the same team as your author) in the City Banks League over a decade earlier and also on occasion for Westside in the Smithfield Summer League. He saw the potential that the venue had, particularly with a layout that lended itself to darts, with small alcoves opposite the bar that could easily become what are now termed as “dart lanes”.
Four boards were soon purchased, with the original one remaining in situ. Oches and scoreboards were put in place, the lighting was improved and now the Porters Lodge was ready. The next task was to attract people to come and play. Paul Butler came into the pub one day, liked what he saw and thought it the ideal venue to expand his IDL from a small, home based League consisting of himself and a few mates, into something much bigger. Over the course of the next two years, the IDL grew in size and popularity and the Lodge was now starting to establish itself as the City’s premier darts pub.
Buoyed by the success (and increased custom), Madigan branched out further by making the venue available for corporate events, hiring it out for companies to have darts nights, a venture that quickly saw on average 1 or 2 private events every month. The Porters Lodge was now a popular and vibrant venue, a far cry from what it had been just a short time before. Teams were now regularly using the venue, not just from the Leagues we already knew about (Banks, Insurance and Smithfield), but also the Trafalgar, and Central London Leagues.
That cold Friday night in January 2011 which I referred to at the beginning was to prove to be a significant date, certainly one that changed my life completely. After the pub had closed, a conversation ensued between myself and Madigan. How about, he said, we create a new organisation, one that could change darts in the City of London for the better? Utilizing our ever-increasing knowledge of the local darts scene, one that could bring Leagues closer, more unified and together? This was the acorn that we hoped would one day grow into a tree once planted into the ground.
We had to be careful when talking about it, with the IDL still continuing to prosper and grow as Madigan naturally didn’t want to jeopardize the existing relationship too much. However, one evening, one of the IDL players overheard one of our conversations, and it excited him enough to offer to join in and help become part of this new movement. That person was Steve Holmes. Madigan was quite reluctant for him to become part of the team, he had known me for many years and wanted to keep it to just the two of us. But I felt that Steve had an infectious and positive enthusiasm, qualities that could be easily harnessed into what we were looking to achieve and I felt that having him on board would give us a greater chance to achieve the goals we were now beginning to set ourselves. That alone was enough for me to want him to be part of what was effectively the first ever CoLDA Committee. In all honesty, I can say that was one of the best things I have done in my entire life. I gained a true friend that day. (It was also a huge honour last summer to present to him a Certificate to commemorate him as CoLDA’s first ever Honorary Life Member. I sincerely hope that he won’t be the last to receive such an accolade).
At some point, the plan would need to be set in order for us to launch it on an unsuspecting public. Posters went up on display in the Lodge around a month before the launch date, stating that Thursday 19th May would see something new emerging in the City darts landscape. Why was that date chosen? The reason was actually quite a simple one. On that day, the Porters was hosting the Spring Cup, the annual one night Team event which was the curtain raiser to the Smithfield season. With such a large captive audience, it seemed to make perfect sense. However, CoLDA very nearly didn’t survive that first night….
The pub was packed out with players, and there I was, ready and eager to announce the birth of a new organisation. However, Madigan asked me to delay and delay as “we didn’t have time” due to the ongoing competition – he was on the Smithfield Committee and decided to change it to an initial round robin format rather than the traditional straight KO, with the result that at closing time the quarter finals were still being played. As the hours passed, people were asking me just when was this big announcement happening? In the end, there was no announcement, other than my quietly having a word with one or two select people.
It certainly wasn’t the most auspicious start, and definitely not the one we hoped for. Madigan then said, “Its ok, we can announce it on another night”. That was enough for me to walk out – citing that “if we can’t deliver on what we stated and when we would state it, how are people going to take us seriously, they won’t”. Steve was of the same viewpoint as I and decided to end his involvement too. Our attitude then was what we eventually used to underpin everything we did in future, and that mantra thankfully remains to this day. “It is not about doing things your way, or my way, but doing it the RIGHT way”.
We both returned after much persuasion, but on the condition that only if the mantra was the future foundation on anything and everything we did. That if we made a public commitment, we had to stick to it and honour it, with no delays or excuses. We had to earn the trust of a now sceptical group of people that we really needed to be on board in order for CoLDA to even be remotely successful.
I did get one comment on the evening of the Spring Cup itself. “Love the idea and what youre trying to do, but I don’t think it will last six months”. The person who said this to me did not do so with malice, it was made more from the viewpoint of having himself being a long-standing committee member in one of the existing Leagues. Consequently he was well aware of the apathy that often was prevalent. Ironically enough, he was one of our biggest supporters back then and still remains so to this day.
Once our plans were out there, it must be said that there was opposition in some quarters, and a reluctance to endorse us. We had no intention of taking over any of the Leagues as was implied on more than one occasion. We saw ourselves as an umbrella organisation. One that, as I have said, would bring leagues closer together, to expose players to other leagues that they would not necessarily have known about. Ultimately, to play our part and help strengthen those Leagues. All of this, done under a banner that would promote the City of London as not just a place to do business, but as a place for social and leisure activities as well.
This is probably the right point in our story to explain why we have our logo and what we had to do in order to get it. Its use was granted to us prior to our official date of formation, and is the main reason why it took the best part of four months from the idea being hatched, to being launched.
The three of us felt that in order for us to look credible, we would have a better chance of achieving that aim if we had some sort of recognition from the established local authority. The Porters was located within the City of London boundary, which we hoped would make our application more viable. We were aided greatly in this by one of the Porters’ regulars, who was a Freeman of the City and able to point us in the right direction.
This meant submitting a formal written application for use of the Coat of Arms, stating who and what we were, and providing a detailed mission statement in support of our application. It had to be a robust, clearly defined statement, setting out our intended goals and what benefits the City would receive in return from giving us their seal of approval. For that to happen, strict guidelines would have to be met. These included amongst other things:
Not using the Coat of Arms in pursuit of financial gain, and therefore always existing as a non-profit entity.
To positively promote the City of London.
To limit our activity to solely within the boundaries of the City of London
Map showing the boundaries of the City of London
The application was sent, and a nervous wait ensued. I then received an email from the Corporation, which took me aback as it was quite aggressive in nature. Unbeknown to us, another League, based in East London, had been using the Corporation logo for some time without having been granted permission to do so, despite being informed on more than one occasion not to use it. I was told in no uncertain terms, that if CoLDA was merely a rebranding or extension of that League, and our application was being used as a way by that League of finally gaining official approval, not only would said application be rejected, but myself, Steve and Rob Madigan would be taken to Court over the unauthorised use of the Corporation of London logo.
This may seem to be a draconian measure. But there are many major companies who would love to have permission to use the logo, and as such the Corporation are very selective over who uses it, ensuring that they use it for the right reasons (and they do monitor those who have it to ensure that they continue to adhere to the required criteria). Fortunately, my response gave them the necessary assurances and they gave us their approval. The funny part of it was, that the GIF image they attached for use in the approval email was actually of a poorer quality than the one I was able to get via Wikipedia! One advantage of being granted use was (maybe one day we will, subject to costs) that we would actually be allowed to be part of the procession to herald the new Lord Mayor of London each November….
(Some of you may have seen in recent times on CoLDA social media why I have seemingly been negative towards new venues etc, because of where they are located. It is not to prevent expansion, but more to protect the current Committee from the same threats of legal action that were aimed at us in the beginning – if the League does expand to the point, and to be fair it is almost at that point now, whereby the vast majority of approved venues are located outside the City boundary rather than within it, and as such breaking the initial pledge to operate solely within the City, then it is quite likely that the current CoLDA logo will have to be changed in the very near future and no longer include the Corporation Coat of Arms.)
So with CoLDA now officially up and running, June 2011 would see us stage our first ever Open competition. Ken Waters (now a resident of Guernsey, more on that to come) will forever be etched in our history. Not only did he win our first competition, but he promptly took the honours in our second for good measure.
We set up a Grand Prix format, with two Opens per month. One was held on a midweek Tuesday evening, with the other on the last Friday of each month. The winners of each Open would take a big step to be able to qualify for our 32 player Finals, with all the places going to those via an ongoing Order of Merit which was updated and displayed at each Open.
Sadly, the local League players did not support our venture in the way we had hoped, with barely a dozen players in attendance at our first three competitions. And even that paltry number included the original “Gang of Three” – yours truly and Messrs Holmes and Madigan. It seemed that the prediction of CoLDA only lasting six months was sadly looking to be correct, and it might not even reach that milestone. The three of us had a meeting to see whether it was worth continuing, of course we all wanted to but if the support wasn’t there, should we just shrug our shoulders, say we tried and then just give up?
As it was now very apparent that the local darts fraternity weren’t either that bothered or interested, Steve said that we should look to use social media and try to attract County and Super League players to our Opens as they may be more receptive to winning prize money. That was the first moment of real significance. We already had the Essex “A” Team Captain, Darren Peetoom practicing in the Porters at lunchtimes, as he worked around the corner. We asked him to help us if possible and CoLDA will always be indebted to him and many others in his darting network, such as Paul Marsh for their valued support and assistance at that time. This helped Steve massively to promote us and it encouraged players from Essex, Kent, London, Surrey and Middlesex in particular to come along and give our competitions a try.
The numbers quickly rose, so much so that little more than a month later, an Open held in the heat of summer (the Porters had no air conditioning either so it was like being stuck in a blast furnace) attracted no less than 63 players, a record still to be bettered to this day. Steve took great pleasure from the fact that players from no less than eight different BDO counties were represented. One of those players was the legendary Deta Hedman, whose continued patronage at that time gave us a level of credibility that was impossible not to capitalize on.
At each event, we boosted our growing reputation still further by promoting other local(ish) events and announcing details of each prior to the start of play. One of our regular attendees was Dan Russell, who is still involved with events at Kent’s county venue, the Six in One in Tonbridge. This became a real benefit to us, people quickly were aware that we weren’t running our events to clash with others, but wanted to promote darts in a positive light. The “you scratch my back” approach worked far better than we could have hoped for, as other events started to promote ours in reciprocation. At the 63 player Open, before the start of play we offered our congratulations to Johnny Stefano, on his recent appointment as London County Team Manager which brought about a large cheer. I still maintain that it was that reaction which gave him the inspiration to go on and promptly win the Open a few hours later! Little was I to know at that time, that I would end up working for Johnny for many years.
We soon broke our first significant barrier. Paul Maybin, a highly respected player and administrator on the London scene made a comment which only served to boost us. He said, “What you guys have done here, is create a community”. Given the number of prestigious and established Opens that many of these players attended, it was a massive compliment and a real inspiration, recognition that we were moving in the right direction. Paul too, was a real help to us and he was always on hand to offer valuable advice and feedback, which was always gratefully received.
One of our main discussions about the Grand Prix Finals regarded the prize money and trophy on offer. We set the prize fund at £2,000. We managed to reach that by taking a proportion of the entrance fees of a fiver per entrant at each Open in order to pay out at the Finals. There were some dissenting voices to begin with, but once it was explained why the money being paid out on the night wasn’t matching the money coming in, they quickly came on board.
As for the trophy, we wanted something that would make an impact, something to show everyone that we meant business and were here to stay. The typical “bog standard” trophy wasn’t ever going to be enough. The first thought was to have something made from Waterford Crystal. That notion was soon shelved – not because we didn’t want a glamorous looking trophy, far from it, but we were more scared that the winner might accidently drop it and smash it into a million pieces if they had had one too many drinks during the course of the evening!
So if not that, then what? A rare “eureka” moment entered my balding ginger head. Why not have a Championship belt? It would be totally unique and we could even call it a “World Championship” like they do in boxing and wrestling etc. That was, unknowingly to us at the time, one of the defining moments in the entire history of CoLDA. We looked at people who made them in the UK, but their belts seemed to be and looked cheap and tacky, and not what we really were looking for. Then, whilst searching online one evening, I stumbled across a fellow in America, who made replica belts of all the major boxing and wrestling companies along with other more bespoke designs. We had found our supplier. Enquiries were soon made, and at a price (£500) he could make one to our design…
The choice we settled on was the WBA World belt, I wanted it ideally to have a crown on it and that was pretty much the only design on offer that had one. We noticed that there were a pair of boxing gloves on it, not really darts related of course, but I said we can use them to say tongue-in cheek that “we will KO our competition”. The belt strap was white in colour with red edging, to reflect the colours of the Corporation. The enamel plate in the middle had the CoLDA logo. A slight panic occurred, as when being sent the template over for final approval prior to the plate being made, that the dart flights and the cross of St George which is part of the London flag were coloured yellow, rather than red! Thankfully they were changed…
On receipt of the belt, we kept it hidden from view until our next scheduled Open. We gave teasers to the players on what it might be, and then on the night itself, just before play began, Steve and Rob’s partner Lesley showed off the prize that our “World Champion” would get. There was an instant “wow” reaction that raised our reputation massively. Craig Munro said “I want that belt, lads” – my response was, “you’ve got to make sure you qualify first mate, then beat 31 others…”
I always take great pride from the fact that CoLDA were in all probability the first darts organization anywhere in the world to have a belt as a winner’s trophy. In later years the PDC would have one made to present to the winner (the short-lived Champions League if memory serves) and the ADC also did likewise a couple of years ago. When it was stated by the ADC that this was something never really done before, I took real pleasure in informing them on social media that we had done this almost a decade earlier….
The last of the Opens took place at the end of September, and before each one, players would look with great interest at the Order of Merit to see where they were in it and what they had to do to qualify. Due to the number of new players that each Open attracted, we decided to make the top 25 players as automatic qualifiers with the last 7 places going to those who had met certain criteria – we didn’t want someone literally entering one event, qualifying without attending any others and then winning the belt and 500 quid outright. We wanted to reward the regular attendees, and that proved to be the right decision especially once we had received positive comments in the wake of it.
In the end fifteen players were able to compete for the last seven places. One of those was a gentleman named Colin Butler. Colin came to our Opens when brought by a friend of his who was already a regular entrant. It transpired that events in his life made him socially awkward and reclusive but as he loved playing darts, his friend brought him along, hoping that he could find some happiness in our friendly venue. He not only was immediately accepted into the CoLDA community, but quickly became a very popular member of it and to many he became THE symbol and essence of who and what we were about. It soon became a tradition of his that, on arriving, the first thing he would do was to seek out Steve and give him a massive bearhug.
(Sadly Colin passed away a few years ago and all that knew him (he was also a staple of the IDL) remember him to this day with genuine fondness. He was a kind, honest and decent man and we all still miss him).
A round robin competition would then see three groups of five do battle. The top 4 in each would get through to the final stage of 7 matches with the winner in each qualifying. The three bottom placed players would compete in a 9 dart shootout, with the lowest scoring player eliminated.
One of those three players was Colin. I was one side of the board to call out each score, with Steve on the other side marking them down. The rest of the players were all gathered round, giving impeccable order. Following the bull up, it was Colin’s turn to throw first. I then called the score of 100. At that point, a huge roar went up, it was spine tingling. Steve and I looked at each other, as if to say “I think we are on to something here”. Colin did get through, but was unable to get over the line in the best of nine legs matches that followed. One who did make it through was Paul Maybin, who was overcome with emotion. “I was desperate to qualify, I would have been gutted to miss out”. That meant so much to us to hear those words, and it showed us just how far we had come in literally a matter of a few weeks. However, a player had to sadly pull out just afterwards, and there was no hesitation or question in who we wanted to take that spare place. It simply had to be Colin.
Time flew by, and soon enough the first week of November arrived. It was Finals time and was scheduled for two consecutive evenings. Night one consisted of a round robin with four groups of eight, the top four in each progressing to the last 16 and the knockout rounds on night two. Doubts were expressed that even with a high-quality field chock full of county players, the group stage would over run. The format for each game was brief, being only two legs in duration. It was unforgiving, but would the players responded and some magnificent darts followed. So much so that the vastly experienced Mark Landers (who had qualified for the PDC Worlds at the Circus Tavern six years earlier), threw seven perfect darts to start a leg before agonisingly missing the eighth.
At the end of the night, having finished on time, I was approached by Ben Burton, who was a County player for Surrey. He stated “I’ve qualified for the UK Open for the last five years, and I thought that was tough. This was even more brutal, but the players loved it because they’ve had to be at the top of their game from minute one. It’s been brilliant”.
The final was an all Essex affair, contested between Darren Peetoom and Richie Howson, over the best of 35 legs (we reduced that to 25 legs the following year as it was a tad too long). It was played on the LIODA stage set which was kindly lent to us by Neil French, one of their committee members. There were breaks after every seven legs, as the stage was set up in the only available space left, in front of the toilets where the pool table was usually sited. Each break was the signal for a mad dash for those who had to wait while the game was in progress! Eventually it was Howson that emerged on top with both players averaging at least 85. Just a few weeks later, Howson won a tour card at Q School.
We were also honoured with the presence of a distinguished guest. The Corporation were taking a keen interest in us, which we presumed was for them to reassure themselves that we were indeed sticking to the promises that we made in our Mission Statement. So on night two, one of the local Ward Aldermen arrived. Immaculately dressed, and looking completely put of place, he introduced himself (I think his name was Robin, but I may be wrong in that. Time does occasionally dull some of the memories). He asked if he could say a few words prior to the actual prize giving.
I said “youre more than welcome to but try to keep it fairly brief as you may get some friendly barracking from the players”. That prediction, to the surprise of no one, came true. I apologized to him afterwards but he said, “That’s fine, I actually enjoyed every minute of it!”. If anything he was more concerned about the pictures taken of him sporting a wide grin with the two lovely “walk-on” ladies who had been hired for the evening. “Please don’t publish them, in case they go on to the Corporation website and the wife sees them”. Fair to say he seemed in his element and I’m sure that it may have caused some envious looks at the next Corporation meeting if he was asked how the evening went!
Another nice touch came from the aforementioned Colin Butler. At the Opens, he was instantly recognisable in his red England shirt and jogging bottoms that he always wore. But on the second evening, there he was, looking dapper in a suit and tie. On thanking him for making such an effort, myself and Steve were left feeling very humbled and more than a bit emotional when he told us that he didn’t actually own a suit, but had hired one especially for the occasion. When we announced each player up to receive their prize money, I was determined that this would be recognized before inviting Colin up. I then said the following:
“We were told a few months ago that we had created a Community. The next player is, in our opinion, the embodiment of that. So much so, he told us that he has hired a suit for the night as a way of thanking us all for what we have done for him”. After Colin’s name was announced, he got an ovation longer and louder than even that of our new Champion. That reaction has remained with Steve and I ever since.
Following the trophy presentation, we thought that we would get a nice break over the Christmas period, before starting the Opens again in January. How wrong we were….
The next instalment of the CoLDA story will tell how we moved from purely running Opens to the setting up of the Singles League, the beginning of our involvement in the Charity sector, and a tumultuous course of events which saw a fifteen year friendship shattered….
