Circus Tavern - Geograph-3222467-by-David-Anstiss

The Circus Tavern is an entertainment venue in

Purfleet Purfleet-on-Thames is a town in the Thurrock unitary authority, Essex, England. It is bordered by the A13 road to the north and the River Thames to the south and is within the easternmost part of the M25 motorway but just outside the Greater Lond ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

, England which hosts functions, cabaret acts and is also a nightclub venue. First opened in 1974, it is most famous as having been a long-time venue of the PDC World Darts Championship. Its capacity is 1100 seated.

Darts Championships

The Circus Tavern was the venue of the PDC World Darts Championships from its inauguration event in 1994, up until 2007, and broadcast on

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British subscription sports channels operated by the satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television sports brand in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It h ...

Phil Taylor Phil Taylor may refer to: * Phil Taylor (musician) (1954–2015), English drummer, best known as "Philthy Animal" Taylor * Phil Taylor (darts player) (born 1960), English darts player * Phil Taylor (American football) (born 1988), American footbal ...

reached the final in all 14 of the PDC World Darts Championship tournaments that were held at the Circus Tavern, winning 11 of those 14 finals. The last World Championship match held at the Circus Tavern was the 2007 PDC World Darts Championship final, where Raymond van Barneveld came from 0–3 down in sets to defeat

, 7–6 in sets, after a sudden death leg. Many people consider this match to be the greatest in the history of darts. At the time of the match, it was not known that it would be the last World Championship to be held at the Circus Tavern. On 2 April 2007,

Barry Hearn Barry Maurice William Hearn (born 19 June 1948) is an English sporting events promoter and the founder and President of promotions company Matchroom Sport. Through Matchroom, Hearn is also involved in many sports including snooker, darts, po ...

announced that the

2008 PDC World Darts Championship The 2008 Ladbrokes.com World Darts Championship was the 15th World Championship organised by the Professional Darts Corporation since it separated from the British Darts Organisation. The event took place between 17 December 2007 and 1 January ...

would be held at the

Alexandra Palace Alexandra Palace is a Grade II listed entertainment and sports venue in London, situated between Wood Green and Muswell Hill in the London Borough of Haringey. It is built on the site of Tottenham Wood and the later Tottenham Wood Farm. Orig ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. Other darts events were held at the Circus Tavern in the three years following. In 2008, the Circus Tavern was the venue for the opening round and the play-offs of the BetFred League of Legends, broadcast on

Setanta Sports Setanta Sports is a sports television company based in Dublin, Ireland broadcasting throughout select Eurasian. The company was formed in 1990 to facilitate the broadcasting of Irish sporting events to international audiences. The company previo ...

. In 2009 and 2010, the Players Championship Finals were held at the Circus Tavern, broadcast on ITV, featuring the top 32 players from the previous year's Players Championship Order of Merit. In 2019, the BDO signed a contract to hold the World Masters at the Circus Tavern. There were also two other televised darts events held at the Circus Tavern: *"The Battle of the Champions" on 29 June 1997, broadcast on

. This event featured

Dennis Priestley Dennis Priestley (born 16 July 1950) is an English former professional darts player. He has won two world championships, and was the first player to win both the BDO and WDC (now PDC) world championships, in 1991 and 1994 respectively. He is ...

defeating

John Part John Part (born June 29, 1966) is a Canadian former professional darts player and current commentator. Nicknamed Darth Maple, he is a three-times World Champion, having won the 1994 BDO World Darts Championship on his world championship debut, ...

3–0 in sets in the battle between the 1994 World Champions, Eric Bristow defeating Alan Evans 3–0 in sets in a Legends match between two old rivals, and reigning PDC World Champion

defeating 1995 BDO World Champion Richie Burnett 4–1 in sets in the Main Event. *"The Showdown" on 21 November 2004, broadcast on

Sky Box Office Sky Box Office is Sky's pay-per-view (PPV) system operated in the United Kingdom and Ireland. There were three branded divisions of Sky Box Office – Sky Cinema Box Office, Sky Sports Box Office and Sky 3D Box Office. Until 1 February 2011, th ...

. This event featured Eric Bristow defeating John Lowe 6–1 in legs in a Legends match between the two old rivals,

Roland Scholten Roland Scholten (born 11 January 1965) is a Dutch former professional darts player who played in events of the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) and British Darts Organisation (BDO). Nicknamed The Tripod and The Flying Dutchman, Scholten turne ...

defeating Wayne Mardle 6–5 in legs in the second match, and the Main Event between the reigning PDC World Champion

and the reigning BDO World Champion Andy Fordham. Originally intended to be best of 13 sets, Taylor was leading 5–2 when Fordham suffered breathing difficulties and was forced to retire. In 2022, the Circus Tavern hosted the inaugural staging of the

World Seniors Darts Championship In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the worl ...

, which was won 5–1 in sets by Robert Thornton over Martin Adams.

References

External links

Official website
{{coord, 51.4859, 0.2461, type:landmark_region:GB-THR, display=title Sports venues in Thurrock Buildings and structures in Thurrock Darts venues Purfleet Darts in the United Kingdom