Rod Harrington
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Rod Harrington (born 30 December 1958) is a former English darts player with the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC). He used the nickname The Prince of Style for his matches, often wearing a suit and waistcoast for his games.
Harrington enjoyed some major success during his professional career including the prestigious Winmau World Masters in 1991 and two successive PDC World Matchplays in 1998 and 1999.
[edit] Early career
He started his career before the game split into two separate organisations during the early 1990s. He accumulated many Open tournament titles including the Belgian Open (1991, 1992), Denmark Open(1991, 1992), French Open (1991, 1993) and the Swedish Open (1991). His 1991 Winmau World Masters victory over Phil Taylor remains one of the Power's rare major final defeats - although he was only a single-time (and current) World Champion at the time.
Harrington made his World Championship debut in 1992, reaching the quarter-finals before losing to Mike Gregory. At the 1993 World Championship, Harrington lost 2-3 to Wayne Weening in the first round despite being seeded fourth for the tournament. After those championships, the majority of the top players left the governing body, the British Darts Organisation to form the WDC (now PDC) in an acrimonious split in the game.
[edit] PDC career
After the WDC/PDC started their own World Championship in 1994, Harrington would be ever-present in the event for the first ten years. He reached the quarter-finals in the inaugural tournament, but his best ever achievement came in the 1995 World Championship - by reaching the final. He lost the final 2-6 to Phil Taylor who was winning the third of his world championship titles at the time.
He reached the World semi-finals on two further occasions, 1998 and 2001 and the quarter-finals in 1997. However, after the 2002 World Championship (where he was seeded third) his form slumped dramatically to the point where he was outside the top 16 by 2003 - and a first round defeat by Alan Warriner would turn out to be he last appearance in the World Championship.
He did have some success at the other major PDC tournaments. In 1998 he beat Ronnie Baxter in the final of the World Matchplay and then successfully defended the title in 1999 with a final victory over Peter Manley. He also reached the final of the first World Grand Prix event in 1998 losing to Phil Taylor, a player who he never managed to beat on television.
[edit] Recent years
After his loss of form, Harrington never officially announced a retirement from the game. He still attempts to qualify for the major UK tournaments including the 2007 World Championship - where he lost in the first qualifying round. He still has a world ranking of 180 (at the start of 2007) but had only won £823 from tournament play in the two years which determined those rankings.
Harrington became a director of the PDC and now also regularly acts in the capacity of a pundit and commentator on Sky's televised darts coverage. He is also currenly a mentor / manager of current PDC player Colin Lloyd.
