It was a sporting event that never failed to banish the post-Christmas blues. It could even rescue the downcast feeling I would have at the prospect of having to write all those dreaded thank-you letters and the butterfly nerves flapping in my tummy at my impending return to boarding school at Eton. Yes, the darts were on the telly. Throughout the 1980s my heroes of the small screen would gather at a venue in Stoke-on-Trent and, safely in bed with a sponsorship deal from Embassy, a cigarette bra