Match each of the sports below with two of the following extracts from commentaries. The words in blue will help you decide.

rugby

tennis

golf

basketball

1. She serves five aces in the first set.

2. He took three putts on the eighteenth green to finish with a round of 72.

3. That’s Johnson’s third personal foul.

4. Another unforced error from Hingis who hit that forehand into the net under no pressure at all.

5. Dalaglio ran from the halfway line to score a fantastic try.

6. He hit a poor drive at the fifth hole and ended up in a bunker.

7. That was a brilliant tackle by Metcalf as Jenkins burst through the middle.

8. The ball hits the ring and Connolly collects the rebound.

WHAT’S THE SPORT?

Match the following commentary extracts with one commentary extracts with one of the sports. The words in blue will help you to decide:

1. What an amazing fight! Lewis has won with a knock-out in the tenth round.

2. They’re coming to the final fence now and the favourite Pink Gin is still in the lead.

3. Schumacher is off the track. He was trying to pass Hill, then he lost control of the car and that’s the race over for him.

4. The next big race is the 800 metres, in which Sarah Gates represents Great Britain.

5. The women’s downhill starts at ten and the men’s slalom event follows at two o’clock.

6. And so Wescott wins the 100 meters freestyle to add to his victories in the breast-stroke, the backstroke and the butterfly.

7. After his performance on the rings, he’ll be hoping for something better on the horse.

8. It looks like tomorrow’s race is off. The forecast is for a force 8 gale!

READING

Read the text: Darts

The player, a 49-year-old Englishman nicknamed ‘The Power’, walks forward to the line on the floor and looks at the target. He will win £200,000 in prize money if he can guide the object between his fingers to a small area on the edge of the circular board in front of him. The crowd in the indoor arena in London has spent most of the game shouting and cheering, but now falls silent. A much bigger audience is watching live on TV, this being one of the most popular televised sports in Britain. He throws, and the crowd erupts – he’s world champion again!

Most people who have lived in Britain will know that the sport described above is darts. The modern form of darts developed in Britain as a game people played in pubs while having a drink and chatting to friends and the local pub is still the place where most of Britain’s darts players practise their skills. At least 6 million people – ten per cent of the total population – play the game at least occasionally.

Since the 1970s darts has also been a serious professional sport, with world championships in which players from more than 30 countries now compete. The most important championships are usually dominated by British players, the most successful of whom is the aforementioned Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor, but Dutch and

Australian players have also done well in recent years.

The sport involves throwing pointed metal darts, from a distance of around 2.5 metres, at a circular board (dartboard) with a diameter of about 45 centimetres. Games are usually contested by two players, who take it in turns to throw three darts at the board. The darts are usually around 15 centimeters in length and have very thin pieces of plastic (flights) attached to their tails that allow them to fly well, while most dartboards are made of a special fibre that allows the darts to penetrate and yet doesn’t get damaged by them.

The board is divided into sections, numbered 1 to 20, for which the players score a corresponding number of points when they hit them with their darts. Low numbers are usually next to high numbers so as to punish players who are inaccurate when aiming for a high number. Within each of the 20 sections there is also a small ‘double’ and an even smaller ‘treble’ (or ‘triple’) area: a player scores 20 points for hitting the double area of the 10 section, for example, and 30 points for hitting the treble.

The maximum score with one dart is 60, achieved by hitting the treble 20. Good players often achieve this, even though each treble section is less than one centimetre wide, and professional players sometimes manage it with three consecutive darts, which always brings a roar from the crowd and an excited shout of ‘one hundred and eighty!’ from the referee.

Decide whether the following statements are true (T) or false (F), or if the text doesn’t say (D).

1. Professional darts games are televised in lots of countries.

2. British players usually do well in the most important international darts championships.

3. Phil Taylor is English.

4. Few people in Britain play darts in pubs any more.

5. It is possible to score over 100 points with one dart.

6. Dartboards are usually made of wood.

7. The highest numbers are grouped together on one side of the dartboard.

8. Players from more than 30 countries try to earn money from playing darts.

9. Darts are made of plastic.

10. Every number on the dartboard has a ‘double’ and a ‘treble’ area.

11. A game of darts finishes when each player has thrown fifteen darts.

12. The treble 20 section is less than one centimetre wide.

Answer the questions below.

1. How many darts does a player throw at the board before it is the other player’s turn?

2. What are flights, and why are they important?

3. How far away from the board are the players when they throw their darts?

4. When would a darts referee shout ‘one hundred and eighty!’?

5. What is special about the material dartboards are made from?

6. Apart from Britain, which two other darts-playing countries are mentioned in the text?

Lesson 25.

 

VOCABULARY

Ball games and equipment

For most ball games you need boots or training shoes (trainers).

For tennis, squash and badminton you need a racket.

For baseball and table tennis you need a bat. For golf you need clubs.

In tennis, volleyball and badminton there is a net across the middle of the court. There is also a net around each goal in football.