Darts cult hero reveals he still works 16-hour days on a farm just weeks before World Championships

A DARTS star has revealed he still works 16-hour days on a farm to make ends meet.

Dirk van Duijvenbode works on an aubergine farm in his native Netherlands.

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And when he is not busy grafting in a greenhouse, he practices darts, particularly now with the World Darts Championship just weeks away.

Van Duijvenbode has been working on the farm since he was 15-years-old and he has an arrangement that allows him to juggle his work with his arrow throwing.

He told : ''I just have an agreement with my employers that my work has to be finished. How I do that I have to figure out for myself.

"Sometimes that results in 16-hour days when you're behind and have deadlines. But generally not.

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"Often once a year is very busy when the certification (kind of audit) comes along with it. Then I have my normal work, and then darts and that certification come on top of it. You don't really have time for that. I do try to take more and more work off my hands.

''Normally I come to start at half past seven. And then I practice at half past nine, half past twelve and half past three. I actually always do that alone.

"Only sometimes towards the World Championship, I sometimes practice with other people, but that's more as a favour to them than that I like it myself.''

Van Duijvenbode even had the privilege of practising his skills on site at the farm.

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Several rooms were built for the world No.25, who now has a professional oche to shoot on.

He continued: ''My employer had been talking about wanting to make a proper dart room for some time. We always had a dart room in what is now the canteen. That one wasn't perfect.

"Then they wanted to create a kind of pub idea. And then they were able to make a nice professional court for me.''