James Wade eyeing more European Championships glory in Germany

I am not a political man, and I’m pretty sure no one wants to hear my views on how to sort the country out, but I cannot ever remember a time when there has been so much talk about the country’s government and party politics.

When you travel around to tournaments you can live in a bit of a bubble, but all I have heard this week is: “Is Boris
coming back?”

“Will there be a general election?”

“Will the Daily Star’s lettuce throw its hat into the ring?” (I made that last one up).

I don’t know what will happen next, but it needs to get sorted fast because looking after the vulnerable people in our society and helping people understand and deal with the stress of this cost-of-living crisis should be dominating their time and efforts – not infighting and jockeying for position.

I have just returned from four days of Players’ Championships in Barnsley, a series of daily floor tournaments which help us to amass ranking points and aid qualification for certain events (such as the Players’ Championship Finals in Minehead in November). In some ways people would find them strange as they are very different from TV tournaments.

They are a lot lower key in terms of fanfare and production value, but the standard can be frighteningly high as people don’t have to deal with the additional pressure of TV cameras, lights, and a raucous crowd in their ear!

I have always liked the intensity of TV tournaments, but these bring a different challenge as they are quick-fire (first to 6 legs), and the matches come thick and fast – you can literally win a game and be back on against a new opponent in a matter of minutes. To win a tournament you need to win six or seven matches in a single day, and it is hard to sustain your performance level to achieve that.

I didn’t really have a deep run in any of the days, although there wasn’t a single day where I went out in the first round I just never really got going. On Saturday I lost 6-5 in a deciding leg to Gary Anderson during a 32 clash, and had a won that I felt that I was really starting to find my stride.

Over the course of the week there was good performances from Damon Heta, Dave Chisnall, Rob Cross and Josh Rock – the latter winning his first title and one that, I am sure, will be the first of many.

We now head to Germany for the Cazoo European Championship and the last few days will have certainly done me good. Having some intense practice ahead of a big TV event is important to me, so playing against my peers for the past four days will have sharpened me up ahead of that task.

I am really hoping to show the very best of my game and lift another TV title in an event that help re-energise my career a couple of years ago when I took the trophy.

I play my first-round match live on ITV4 on Thursday evening, so put a note in the diary, pre-warn the pizza delivery company and get ready to join me!

Thanks for the support.

Wadey

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