The Oche Life Podcast

I was pleased to be joined by 'The Prince of Darkness' Ashley Coleman who has made strides in the game since turning pro a couple of years ago with highlights such as being the current ADC East of England belt holder and winning Series 14 Week 5 of Modus Super Series defeating the likes of Lee Cocks, Scott Campbell & Ciaran Forde before beating recently World Championship qualified Tommy Morris 4-3 in the weekly final. 
Ash is from the county of Suffolk in East of England and mixes his time between darts and his job as a Powder Coater making stuff for big events such as the Ally Pally in the past. Ash would play lots of Local Leagues and County Championships for years making a name for himself, even playing at 2017 WDF World Masters event.
Outside of being a pro, Ashley also does some darts content on the YouTube scene doing videos with the likes of The Darts Referee Jack Langston & the BullHitters developing a connection with his enthusiasm for the game which has led him to be a very liked player in the darting world. 
Since his debut at Modus Super Series, Ashley has become a bit of a MSS enigma, always giving himself a run to finals night with winning Series 14 Week 5 and challenging for Champions Week in July. 
Last of all with the acknowledgement from Ash we spoke about how he manages to cope on the dartboard with being diagnosed with Autism & ADHD as a result in his own words Ashley doesn't at all get affected by nerves when he is on the oche in any aspect.
Thanks Ashley for a great chat, all the best mate

This week ahead of the return of the unique World Grand Prix in Leicester, I was as always joined by Raffo to preview this year's action as we also go over last week's Pro Tour titles, World Series of Darts finalists as well as the current Luke Littler discussions about boycotting further tournaments in The Netherlands.
The World Grand Prix first took stage in 1998 and would evolve into the unique Double in, Double out format not long after. From 2001-2019 it was staged in Dublin, Ireland before being played in Coventry in 2020 then moving to its now home at Mattioli Arena in Leicester from 2021. This tournament for me always delivers drama due to the format and expect more of the same here.
We break down the draw by quarter and take our guesses at who will go well and who will flop with a consensus winner at the end. 
Will Luke Littler retain his Grand Prix crown after an unbelievable final display last year winning 6-1 against Luke Humphries. Will Luke Humphries make it to a 4th final in a row here? Could we see Gezzy Price back in the major tv titles or Gian van Veen continue a decent major streak or could some outside of the box have a deep run? Be sure to find out. Thanks to everyone foe listening in if you choose to!
Download via Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Podbean. Enjoy the Darts!

I was pleased to be joined by Pro Tour title winner, European Tour semi finallist & World Number 30 (at time of recording) now up to 28th 'Hawkeye' Kevin Doets who took time to speak from his home in Sweden after what has been a monumental breakthrough season from the Almere star.
Kevin is from Almere in The Netherlands but for years has been based in Sweden where he resides and has played the game since 2011. In 2019 Kevin would win Catalonia Open defeating Carlos Arola in the final. Through 2020 & 2021, Kevin would make his name on Developmental Tour & PDC Challenge Tour collecting a few titles.
Doets would win Tour card for PDC in 2022 finishing 3rd on European Q School Order of Merit Standings and would collect a Dev title along the way in 2022 defeating Josh Rock 5-3 in Event 4. In 2023 would see Kevin make his first Pro Tour final at PC20 beaten in the final by Luke Humphries which would help him then qualify for 2024 PDC World Darts Championship at Alexandra Palace where he would defeat Stowe Buntz 3-0 in R1 before narrowly losing out to then World Number 1 Michael Smith 3-2 averaging just shy of 100. 2024 would also see Doets make World Series of Darts finals debut.
2025 Worlds would see Hawkeye get revenge on Bully Boy in a WC rematch winning 3-2, defeating Krzysztof Ratajksi 4-3 before losing to Chris Dobey 4-3 in Last 16 in a nailbiter. Yet again would see Kevin make 2025 World Series of Darts finals.
This year in 2026 has seen Hawkeye go from strength to strength averaging 117 in European Tour match against Jonas Masalin, winning Pro Tour 13 defeating Luke Woodhouse 8-5 in the final to win his first PDC title then follow it up with getting to final of Austrian Darts Open I Graz defeating the likes of Chris Landman 6-3, Ryan Searle 6-2, Ryan Joyce 6-2, Woodhouse 6-3 averaging 112, Rob Cross 7-3 before losing out to Josh Rock 8-6 in the final. Kevin would make his World Matchplay debut at Winter Gardens averaging 104 in a 10-6 defeat to Ross Smith.
A player with unlimited bags of talent. A fine guy too to chat with! Hope you enjoy, thanks Kevin!

Joining me on the podcast from his home in Bonnyrigg, outside of Edinburgh was Scotland internationalist Stuart Wares, who took time to speak ahead of his trip to Milton Keynes for PDC Challenge Tour events. 
Stuart originally from Wick about as far up in Scotland as you can go before moving to Edinburgh at around 18 years of age has played Darts for a long period of time and in his time has won Home Internationals with Scotland, reached a Scottish Open final and played in WDF World Masters in 2025 beating Bogi Arge 4-2, Matthew Smith 4-3 & Phillipe van Gasse 4-1 in the group stages before losing 5-3 to young upcoming Archie Self 5-3 but Stuart had developed food poisoning in that time and tells us the full story of that week in Hungary. 
Stuart has been playing on some of Challenge Tour events and at Challenge Tour 10 getting through a few rounds  beating the likes of Mark McGeeney, Danny Lauby Jnr & Mike Warburton before narrow defeat to Nathan Potter.  Stuart is also a part of UK Arrows a senior establishment stable featuring the likes of Richie Burnett.
Thanks Stu for the chat, all the best for the future, download via Podbean, Apple & Spotify!

In this latest episode it was a pleasure to be joined by 5x PDC North American Tour title winner, 2x CDC Continental Champion & 2x PDC World Darts Championship participant Alex Spellman calling in from Fuquay-Varina in North Carolina, in what is a busy schedule for The Jackal I'm thankful for his time. Alex also legit has one of the coolest symbols in the game with The Jackal symbolised on every event jersey!
Alex is from North Carolina, USA and first tried his hand at Darts when his father needed a spare hand to play in a game and having played on a board growing up would give it a go where he even admitted he didn't really know the rules but gave it a go anyway.
It would be in the lockdown period of 2020 when Alex would properly try at Darts and seen improvement each time he played. Carefully developing super steady and smooth throwing style, Alex would start appearing on the American Darts scene who he is a proud ambassador of still to this day. Alex is also a well respected Darts Coach and uses very articulate methodology from past experiences on tour into his clients to make them much better players giving them guidance every step of the way.
Only a professional for 6 years and by his standards still a novice on the big stages and still looking to get better, Alex has won CDC (North American Tour) Continental Cup twice, was top of North American Tour Order of Merit Standings in 2023, hit a 9 dart finish against Sylvain Bordeau at 2024 CDC Cross Border Challenge, played on Modus Super Series defeating a certain Luke Littler 3 times they have played, 5x North American Tour title winner, stacks of WDF ranked American titles, 2025 Grand Slam of Darts participant and of course a 2x PDC World Championship participant in 2024 averaging 97 in 3-1 defeat to Ryan Joyce then this past World's running into Gabriel Clemens.
We learn more about Alex as a person, very down to earth, humble and always approachable as well as future goals. The Jackal was a fantastic guest and can't thank him enough, I hope you all enjoy as much as I did! Download via Podbean, Apple & Spotify.

I was pleased to be joined by PDC Pro & recent European Tour semi finallist on his debut 'The Castleford Tiger' Tom Sykes as he takes time to chat after a good start to PDC life with numerous good performances on PDC Pro Tour & of course making it all the way to the Semi Finals in Bratislava defeating the likes of Niko Springer, Martin Schindler, Cameron Menzies & Jermaine Wattimena before in his own words running out of steam a little bit in the semis against Former World Champ Rob Cross, still a magnificent achievement from the Tiger.
Tom is from Castleford in West Yorkshire and got started with a throw in the house before going to the pubs as an 18 year old to start playing competitively. Outside of Darts, Tom is a big fan of Rugby League side Castleford Tigers & loves to play Golf with a handicap of around 14. 
In 2014 Tom would play in the BDO World Trophy giving him some valuable stage experience to take forward and would ply his trade for a few years on Challenge Tour while making a couple of unsuccessful efforts at PDC Q School. Modus Super Series has transformed Tom's game into being able to playing well consistently over the past 2/3 years winning Modus Super Series title a couple of times and making a few Finals.
2025 would see Tom make his PDC Major Debut at UK Open in Minehead defeating Thibaut Tricole 6-1 before losing 6-4 to Willie O'connor in R2 while this year would see Tom make it to R3 defeating Arno Merk 6-4 & Cristo Reyes 6-4 before narrowly losing 10-8 to Kai Gotthardt in R3 at Minehead. 
Tom will compete in Hungarian Darts Trophy on European Tour after defeating Peter Wright, Piero Ljubic & Greg Ritchie to qualify for Hungary which I wish him all the best for.
Find out how Tom manages to get on in the ending segment The Nickname Quiz can Tom get 8/8 right? Find out in the episode! Download via Podbean, Apple & Spotify. Cheers Tom!

In the first Oche Life Podcast episode in 4 months, we are back with the podcast as myself & Betfred's Sean Rafferty do a full preview into next weeks World Matchplay at Winter Gardens with some expected consensus picks as well as a few left field picks in the first round matches.
We predict the matches by bracket and predict the quarter winners to make the semi finals as well as do score predictions for the matches and who we inevitably think will become this year's World Matchplay Champion. Can anyone topple Luke Littler going back to back? 
Had a fun chat about some events just passed with Sean and look out at some future stars.
Download via Podbean, Apple & Spotify! Take a listen if you could. Bumper episode but fully detailed!

In the first episode of 2026 I was pleased to be joined by one of the elite darting referees and host of Tops & Tales Podcast 'Houdini' Huw Ware who kindly spent some time on the podcast amongst a very busy schedule on PDC circuit.
Huw would play at 2011 WDF World Cup in Aberdeen for Wales and would play against the likes of Jeffrey De Zwaan, Jimmy Hendriks & would even beat recently crowned WDF World Champion Jimmy van Schie in a best of 1 leg match in that event. A very cool achievement.
Huw would start refereeing local darts matches and would get his break refereeing on the BDO circuit at World Masters at a young age and would get the chance to ref a couple of matches at BDO World Darts Championship at Lakeside! Huw would do 5 years in total with BDO and would make the switch around about 2017 to PDC circuit but would take a little bit of time before getting a regular spot on the tour but would referee in some Premier League matches and other events. 
It was round about 2021 where Huw would step up to the official 4th referee on the schedule and has not looked back since becoming instantly recognisable and is now one of the elite refs in the sport! 
Thanks so much to Huw for coming on to chat I really appreciate it! It was a great chat! All the best for this year on your adventures!
Download via Podbean, Apple Podcasts & Spotify! 

In this latest episode of The Oche Life I was pleased to be joined by current PDC Tour Card holder Tom Bissell who joined me straight off of a competition win back home in the Black Country including defeating former PDC & BDO star Jamie Hughes inbthe quarter finals.
Tom joins us after his first full year on the biggest tour in Darts as we find out about his experiences and more including making it into 3x European Tour events in Austria, Hungary & Germany.
Tom would play Rugby growing up before getting into Darts after an injury and would play in the pub leagues, county leagues and Super leagues down in the Black Country alongside some quality operators.
Tom would go onto Q School and would be a star of the event gaining his full PDC Tour card which he would openly admit was a stark contrast from the days of the leagues! Tom would play some of the best players on the Players Championship floor events including the likes of Gerwyn Price & Stephen Bunting.
In Tom's Euro Tour experiences at Austrian Darts Open  would lose to Ricardo Pietreczko while in Hungary he would beat Dirk van Duijvenbode before losing to Mike De Decker and in Germany put on a valiant effort in a narrow defeat to Luke Woodhouse something The Bizzness can take great experiences from!
Had a lot of fun chatting with Tom who was a really nice guy! All the best for 2026!
Remember to download via Podbean, Spotify & Apple Podcasts!

It was a pleasure to be joined by 13x WDF title winner including 2025 World Masters major & current WDF World Number 1 player Jimmy van Schie just as he is about to travel to Lakeside to try and add World Champion to his ever growing list of achievements! 
The Dutch Sequoia is from Breda in The Netherlands and started Darts after playing a little bit of Basketball growing up but Darts was also the preference for the tall Dutch man. Jimmy made his PDC Pro Tour debut in 2010 & would also win Gold Medal at 2011 WDF European Cup Youth in Aberdeen alongside Jimmy Hendriks, Jeffrey De Zwaan & Mike Zuydwijk. 
After a length of time away from the game Jimmy has transformed himself into a serial winner over the past couple of seasons on WDF circuit stamping his authority as the Number 1 player on tour with 13x titles & 4 Modus Super Series week wins! At World Masters in Hungary 'The Dutch Sequoia' would 3 group games & 7 knockout games to stand tall as the World Master defeating the likes of David Pallett, Jason Brandon & Jeff Smith along the way. 
We talk about the expectations of being the best player on WDF and if he ever struggles with that pressure some times. Jimmy was very open about it and gave some good answers & also in Pro Knowledge see how the Dutch star gets on can he beat Andy Davidson's 5? Find out!
With the Lakeside starting this week, I wish Jimmy van Schie all the best in his aspirations of being World Champ.
Download via Podbean, Apple & Spotify! Thanks for the support