Nitin Kumar admitted his landmark first win on the Paddy Power World Darts Championship stage could prove to be ‘life-changing’.
Kumar created history at London’s Alexandra Palace last weekend, defeating Richard Veenstra in a five-set thriller to become the first Indian player to triumph on the sport’s biggest stage.
The 40-year-old defied five ton-plus checkouts from Veenstra to book his place in round two, converting nine of his 12 attempts at double to cap off a stunning display of combination finishing.
“I have been playing darts for close to 30 years. The dream was always to be a World Champion,” claimed Kumar, who is featuring in his fifth World Championship campaign.
“To give it my all, something I have never done at this level before and in front of that kind of crowd before, it was wonderful.
“Hopefully this will open the floodgates to a billion players from India.
“In ten years’ time, if you have eight people in the World Championship walking on to Bollywood music or Punjabi, don’t blame me. It’s happening!
“I play a lot of local tournaments back in Dubai, where I work, and my averages there are great, but no one sees that.
“Match practice has affected me, but it's different on the World Championship stage. It's different at Ally Pally.
“Three or four days a week, you're playing darts. You're supposed to go there, work and save money - you can't. You're just playing darts all the time.
“There are lots of expats, lots of Asians, Filipinos, Scottish and British guys, loads of great players. Ex-county players come in every weekend and wipe the floor with me, so it's fun."
Kumar suffered a hat-trick of whitewash defeats in his first three World Championship appearances, before claiming his first set on the Alexandra Palace stage against Martin Lukeman 12 months ago.
The man nicknamed ‘The Royal Bengal’ is now bidding to claim the scalp of world number four Stephen Bunting on Saturday evening – and he’s relishing the challenge.
“I am going to take it a game at a time,” insisted the two-time World Cup qualifier.
“I don’t think the game against Richard is the best that I have played. I know I can play better.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen but there will be 110 per cent effort from myself and I am going to give it my all, and we’ll see what happens.”
The 2025/26 Paddy Power World Darts Championship is being broadcast live on Sky Sports in the UK, through the PDC's worldwide broadcast partners including DAZN and Viaplay, and on PDCTV (excluding UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria & Switzerland based subscribers).
2025/26 Paddy Power World Darts Championship
Saturday December 20
Evening Session (1900 GMT)
Round Two x4
Michael Smith v Niels Zonneveld
Chris Dobey v Andrew Gilding
Stephen Bunting v Nitin Kumar