Rob Cross on previous wins as World Darts Championship motivation: You’ve won it once, you can win it again | dart news

Rob Cross will always enter Alexandra Palace with the pressure of being a former champion on his shoulders, but at the World Championships he doesn’t spend any time focusing on that.

Cross shocked the world on his debut for Palace in 2018 when he beat Phil Taylor 7-2 and walked away as champion just 11 months after turning professional.

He has since established himself as one of the world’s best players and enters the 2024/25 tournament ranked fourth in the world on the PDC Order of Merit.

Cross enters the World Championships as one of the top names in the headlines every year, with significant wins on his resume in tournaments where he always performs well.

But rather than seeing his previous wins as an added layer of pressure, Kroos prefers to see it all as motivation: if he’s won it once before, there’s no reason he can’t do it again.

“I think there’s a big difference in winning anyway. In general, it’s always nice to know that you can win something,” Cross said.

“Because when you haven’t done it or you haven’t done it or you haven’t won, you’re saying to yourself, ‘Okay, I wish I could win.’

“But at the same time it’s disappointing if we don’t win again.

“So I’ve been going through about six or seven years of drought now and at some point we need to change that.

“I think the World Championships were the most difficult for me because anyone who becomes a world champion never wants to give it back, and I understand that, but I understand that.”

“But generally, if I come across something that I advocate or something like that, it doesn’t even enter my brain. To be honest, I’m not much of a thinker.

“It’s always better to win than to have a title, but at the same time you can’t go in and look at it like that, trying to defend money from two years ago or a year ago or whatever, it’s just extra pressure.

“I’ll go there and probably look at it as a positive and I’ll think to myself, well, I won it once, so it’s not a negative thing, I can win it again.”

“Pressure is man-made and never a good thing, right?”

Cross doesn’t like putting extra pressure on himself, but he’s always motivated to one day be announced as a two-time world champion.

“I always set myself up and think about the overall picture going in. I want to win every tournament I enter, because obviously that’s just a mindset, but at the same time I just go from game to game, literally, as they come. “Come thick and fast,” he added.

“Just take it one game at a time, literally look at the tip of your nose and look no further than that.

“Touch the wood. I’ve never had a bad game there. I really enjoy it and I love it. It’s just one of those places where I walk with all the memories I had there and other things. I will always love the wood. I Even if you are not playing, you are there.

“If you want to play your best darts and can play your best darts, you want to do it there.

“I want to win it all. I want to be announced as a two-time world champion. At the same time, I just have to take it one game at a time. I think this is one of the biggest tournaments in the world, where everyone can play. Raise your game.”

Kroos on that little game: ‘He’s really good at it’

The 2023/24 tournament provided darts fans with some great moments and performances, including ‘Voltage’, where Cross took on a semi-final for the ages against a certain Luke Littler on his debut.

Littler averaged 106.05, hitting a maximum of 16 and hitting huge finishes of 149, 142 and 132 to secure a stunning 6-2 win, and Cross, now able to see the bigger picture, was impressed by how much that run had added to the game. Make sure it’s “amazing.” .

“To be honest, we are all born to be winners. But when you lose, it feels bad,” Cross said.

“But if you look at the bigger picture, what that boy and Luke have achieved since then is simply amazing.

“I’m not one to be jealous of darts away or looking in. I think I’ll get up there. I’m a competitor, I want to win when I’m up there, but when you get down I look at the guy.” , I think he’s really great. “He’s really great in games too.”

Cross will be popular again this year, but there has been plenty of shock and confusion in darts in 2024 and the world number four does not rule out the possibility of more happening at Ally Pally.

“I think it’s darts now,” Cross added, “if you went back 10 years you would have picked three, or if you’re being generous, four people who could win the tournament.”

“Now all of a sudden, if you’re looking at it, you’re probably only getting 24 out of 32, and you can take the other eight out.

“So I think it’s good for the observer. I think it’s good for the people at home looking in and watching.”

When is the World Darts Championship held?

The tournament takes place at Alexandra Palace on Sunday 15 December, with three first round matches and one second round match on the opening evening.

Live darts will be played over the next eight days, including seven afternoon sessions, with a three-day break typically from Christmas Eve to Boxing Day before returning for a third round and doubles session on December 27.

The third and fourth rounds of competition will be completed by December 30 before a break on New Year’s Eve, with quarter-finals taking place over two sessions on New Year’s Day, before the semi-finals on January 2 and the final on Friday, January 3.

The full daily schedule for this year’s tournament can be found here.

Who will win the Paddy Power World Darts Championship? Watch every match live and exclusively on Sky Sports’ dedicated darts channel from 15 December to 3 January. Stream darts and other top sports with NOW.