Heta insists he "hasn't fallen off the face of the earth"

HARD-WORKING Damon Heta insists he's not fallen off the face of the earth and believes in a snowball effect as he aims to make things happen again.

The Aussie star produced a superb night-one showing in Dortmund to defeat James Wade and move into a last 16 European Championship Finals tie against top seed Ross Smith at the Westfalenhallen.

Heta admits it was a huge result for him after a recent run of setbacks at the past stagings of the event and also as he looks to build momentum at a key point of the term.

The Heat is working constantly to find his best form and said: "I think it's just I look at my game, I probably look at my game more than most and I feel I just do things off the board no-one will see. I know what I need to do and what need not do because there's peaks and troughs in darts and it's all about gaining those percentages at the end of the day.

"I don't want to say too much, but I am working on what I need to work on and things will start heading my way. And all it has to do is a little bit of a snowball effect and things will happen again.

"It's not like I've fallen off the face of the earth, to be fair. I've been pretty good, and [if] people want to bag me for where I'm at at the moment, then that's probably a good thing. If they're my bad moments, like I've said in many interviews, then I'm doing alright."

Speaking after his win over Wade, he reflected on his recent showings and said: "Crazy, I've been in the Euro Finals for a ridiculous amount of years. I don't know how many Euro finals I've been in. it must have been in, what, five or six. And I've only won one game. It doesn't make sense in my mind.

"It doesn't make sense that I put in so much work and I do so much and I'm always involved, but yet I've only got one win. Make it make sense. So this is massive in retrospect.

"It's hard when people keep reminding you, isn't it? Social media is massive. You cannot keep away from social media because that's the way the game is, that's the way life is. It feels like everyone is on social media, so, even if I tried to keep away, it feels like people will remind me, whether you have pre-interviews or not, they will remind you before then. It's just how it is. So this is a massive relief and it's only a first round, I've got so much more to go, but I can take this on the chin, just move on, just continue on and play some free darts."