Leo Laurens (born 30 July 1952) is a Belgian former professional

darts Darts is a competitive sport in which two or more players bare-handedly throw small projectile point, sharp-pointed projectile, projectiles known as dart (missile), darts at a round shooting target, target known as a #Dartboard, dartboard. Point ...

player who competed in

British Darts Organisation The British Darts Organisation (BDO) was a darts organisation founded on 7 January 1973 by Olly Croft, and dissolved in 2020 under the stewardship of Des Jacklin. Made up of 66 member counties, it oversaw professional, semi-professional and ...

(BDO) events. At the end of 1993, he was number one in the WDF world rankings after all of the BDO's top players broke away to form the World Darts Council (now the

Professional Darts Corporation The Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) is a professional darts organisation in the United Kingdom, established in 1992 when a group of leading players split from the British Darts Organisation (BDO) to form what was initially called the Wor ...

, PDC). Despite his new accolade, Laurens never won a major title.

Career

Laurens made his World Championship debut in 1989, losing in the first round to American Rick Ney. He returned a year later, beating Canada's

Bob Sinnaeve Bob Sinnaeve (born October 10, 1949) is a Canadian former professional darts player. Early career Sinnaeve took up darts in 1973 as an alternative to bowling, as he felt the darts circuit would give him more time to spend with his wife, Judy. H ...

, before losing to

Mike Gregory Michael Keith Gregory (20 May 1964 – 19 November 2007) was an English professional rugby league footballer and coach. As a player, Gregory played either as a second-row or loose forward, and spent most of his club career at Warrington, ma ...

. His best performance came in 1997, where he reached the quarter-finals after beating Ritchie Davies and

Richie Burnett Richard Mark Burnett (born 7 February 1967), nicknamed Prince of Wales, is a Welsh professional darts player who competes in Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) and World Seniors Darts (WSD) events. He was formerly ranked BDO world number one. ...

. He lost to reigning champion

Steve Beaton Steve Beaton (born 5 April 1964) is an English former professional darts player who competes in World Seniors Darts (WSD) events. Nicknamed "the Bronzed Adonis", Beaton formerly formerly competed in British Darts Organisation (BDO), World Dart ...

. Laurens also holds the record for most 180's scored in a first-round match at the World Championship, with nine, although John Henderson holds the record for a best of 5 sets match with 12. He also played in the

Winmau World Masters The World Masters is a darts tournament, initially organised by the British Darts Organisation from 1974 and later by the World Darts Federation. It is one of the longest-running and most prestigious of the BDO/WDF tournaments. The tournament w ...

in 1988, 1993, and 1995, losing in the first round on each occasion.

World Championship performances

BDO

*1989: 1st round (lost to Rick Ney 1–3) (sets) *1990: 2nd round (lost to

1–3) *1994: 2nd round (lost to Magnus Caris 0–3) *1996: 1st round (lost to

Raymond van Barneveld Raymond van Barneveld (born 20 April 1967) is a Dutch professional darts player who competes in Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) events, where he was ranked world number one from January 2008 to June 2008. Nicknamed "Barney", he is a five-t ...

0–3) *1997: Quarter-finals (lost to

3–4)

References

External links

Stats on Darts Database
Living people Place of birth missing (living people) Belgian darts players British Darts Organisation players People from Heist-op-den-Berg 1952 births Sportspeople from Antwerp Province {{Belgium-sport-bio-stub