EVANS PLANS CRAZIEST CHRISTMAS WALK-ON YET

RICKY EVANS is ready to unleash his most outrageous Ally Pally Christmas walk-on yet, complete with elves, reindeer and SNOWBALLS.

‘Rapid’, who famously bounces out to ‘Merry Christmas Everyone’ by Shakin’ Stevens, is plotting another festive showstopper when he hits the World Championship stage next month.

The Kettering ace heads into the Players Championship Finals in a confident mood after his run to the Grand Slam quarter-finals, where he eventually went down 16-9 to Gerwyn Price.

Evans is hell-bent on serving up a Christmas entrance fans will be talking about long after the tinsel comes down at the iconic North London venue.

He told Tungsten Tales: “It will be the same Christmas walk-on, I know that, but I’ve got a different shirt this year.

“I’ll have some Christmas trousers on, I want to walk on with genuine elves and I want reindeers.

“I’d like to throw snowballs into the crowd with presents and flights in.

“I think there is too much health and safety involved with most of my walk-ons.

“We will still do the big Christmas song everyone associates me with.

“For someone that hates Christmas, by the way, I love doing the festive walk-on because everyone seems to be in a party mood.

“They kind of get on my side because of the shirt and the walk-ons.

“The more the merrier — it gets my fanbase up.

“I will always do it. I have a sticky feeling others will get Christmas shirts and walk-ons because they’ve seen my popularity.”

World No40 Evans has reached one quarter-final on the ProTour this year, at Players Championship 16.

But while Evans has the personality and panache to light up the stage, he knows a Premier League place won’t come until his results match the show.

He added: “Of course it’s the biggest exhibition of darts. A few bigger names have told me I have everything to be in the Premier League – except the darts!

“The consistency and the big averages… that’s something I can work on because it’s my job.

“I’ve got the likeability factor, the walk-on, the popularity with the crowd. They like me for some reason, and my fast-paced darts help.

“It’s still a goal of mine one day, but I know I’m nowhere near that yet.

“If my darts come out consistently and my ranking goes up, then who knows in a couple of years.

“But there are a good twenty or thirty players ahead of me in the pecking order. If you can’t dream it, you can’t do it.”

Image by Taylor Lanning.