So, word on the street is the Swedish World Cup of Darts team could, in fact, consist of no actual Swedes. Yep, that’s right. If Kevin Doets goes all Jeffrey de Graaf on us, he could soon end up carrying a different passport to his Dutch one and suddenly become more Swedish than Ericsson.
You really do have to wonder what the world is coming to when the same nation that gave us IKEA, Volvo and the annual emotional trauma of Eurovision can’t won’t even have two tungsten-flingers born within its own borders representing them on the world stage. Frankly, after unleashing ABBA upon humanity for half a century, perhaps this is simply the universe finally settling the score.
It’s not even as though Kev and Jeff – who sound less like darts players and more like exhausted LAPD detectives six days away from retirement – have Swedish parents or some deep ancestral Viking bloodline stretching back to pillaging villages with axes. No. They met fit Swedish women, understandably moved into beautifully organised Scandinavian homes where every candle costs £47, and one has already switched national allegiances while the other appears increasingly tempted.
Now, both Doets and De Graaf have Swedish-born children, so there absolutely is a legitimate family connection there. Years from now, if those kids inherit their fathers’ darting ability instead of merely inheriting an unhealthy addiction to flat-pack furniture and fermented fish, they have every right to pull on a yellow jersey in whichever sport they choose to pursue. But is what is happening here right?
And I’m thinking here from the perspective of those actually born and raised in Sweden. Take Oskar Lukasiak and Victor Tingstom for example. Poor sods have already been shoved further down the succession queue than Prince Harry at a royal family barbecue. Somewhere in Stockholm not too far in the distant future, there could well be a darts player staring angrily wondering why his national team has suddenly – and quite literally – gone Dutch.
We’ve seen this sort of thing constantly in sport. English-born footballers so unbelievably shite they’d have less chance of getting into the England squad than octogenarian Ethel who works down the launderette.
Anyway, I digress.
Where were we? Oh yes – footballers suddenly discovering their grandad once sneezed near Montenegro so it counts. You can practically hear the frantic typing on ancestry.com every international break. Please let Nana have been born somewhere with terrible defenders.
Athletes from Africa head over to places like Denmark and Norway for training camps and the next minute they’re lining up at international meets representing them. I’m not blaming the runners whatsoever – fair play to them – but it does say a lot about modern sport when you can happily ditch your national identity for a few laps running around a track.
And nowadays, changing identity in general seems alarmingly straightforward. Don’t fancy being a bloke anymore? Fine. Stick on a wig, change your name, turn up at the PDC Women’s Series and start averaging ninety until somebody from the DRA eventually coughs awkwardly and says, “Hang on a minute Steve – or whatever your name is now. You can’t be here son.”
If Doets does decide to switch nationality to Sweden, it’s probably down to his son’s place of birth and his new life with a lovely partner over there. He clearly appears settled and, if he intends to remain there for the foreseeable future, he may as well go the whole hog and obtain citizenship properly.
And that’s not exactly easy.
I can’t spend three hours aimlessly wandering around IKEA pretending to compare bookshelves while internally plotting violence against an instruction manual written by Bjorn from ABBA himself, then suddenly emerge clutching a Swedish passport and a craving for meatballs. It doesn’t work like that. Buying a Volvo and driving cautiously around Britain whilst listening to melancholic indie music doesn’t suddenly qualify me for Stockholm residency either.
But if Doets does gain citizenship, he’ll be absolutely nailed on for a World Cup spot. Even before his recent surge in form, he was already streets ahead of every other Swede on the Order of Merit – and the gap is only growing larger.
Honestly, if I were Lukasiak or Tingstom, I’d already be checking whether the family dog has any Icelandic roots. Sweden seems a wonderful place to live, but the more Dutch dartists who decide the same thing, the further the native Swedes drift from ever reaching the World Cup themselves.
Unless, of course, they eventually decide to solve the issue the old-fashioned way – by kidnapping the imposters and nicking their shirts before the walk-on starts.
