The Sad Story Of Simon Whitlock Explained In 10 Minutes

The beard. The ponytail. The same look. But everything else has changed. For years darts fans assumed Simon Whitlock was still among the sport's elite — World Championship finalist, European champion, Premier League finalist, World Cup winner, a top ten player for years. Yet while fans remembered the image of The Wizard his ranking was quietly collapsing. Not overnight. Not because of one injury. Not because of one disastrous season. Through a slow decline that stretched across almost an entire decade. Eventually the unthinkable happened. Whitlock fell out of the world's top 32. Then the top 64. Then lost the tour card that had kept him on the PDC circuit for over a decade. Long before the cameras tracked his every throw Whitlock was already a force in the clubs and league halls of New South Wales — titles at the Oceanic Masters, the Australian Grand Masters and the Pacific Masters, more than 30 domestic tournaments won by 2010. The leap to international recognition came at Lakeside in 2008 — an unseeded outsider battling to the BDO World Championship final, pushing Mark Webster to 7-5. In 2009 he left the BDO for the PDC. Within a year he was contesting the 2010 World Championship final at Alexandra Palace — wins over Per Larsen, James Wade, Robert Thornton, a quarter-final thriller against Van Barneveld, a razor-thin semi-final over Peter Wright, then Phil Taylor in the final. A 170 checkout, a dozen 180s, and still Taylor's pace sealed it. 2012 — Whitlock's first major PDC title, the European Championship, beating Wes Newton 11-5. The same year a Premier League final. Three World Championship semi-finals. World ranking number three in 2014. For nearly half a decade a fixture inside the top ten. Then between 2014 and 2019 the results at Alexandra Palace told a quieter story. First round exits in 2014 and 2015. Second round exits in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Five straight years without a single deep run at the sport's biggest event — each loss rationalised individually, but the pattern never broke. The PDC ranking system creates a lag — prize money counts for 24 months, so a strong finish from years earlier masks a player's decline until it suddenly doesn't. By the time Whitlock's best years finally dropped off the rolling total the underlying weakness could no longer be hidden. November 2020 — a single week seemed to rewrite the story. Ranked outside the top 20, Whitlock faced Michael van Gerwen in the Grand Slam quarter-final. Over 31 legs he landed 20 maximum 180s — shattering the tournament record — and won 16-15 with a nerveless bull finish. Headlines called it a comeback. But the averages told a quieter story. No major titles followed. No return to the top ten. The 2020 surge was a single spike in a downward trend — a hot hand in a cold season, not the start of something new. By the end of 2018 Whitlock was still inside the top eight. By 2020 he had dropped outside the top 32. After the 2023 World Championship he fell outside the top 64. December 2024 — Whitlock lost his PDC Tour Card after fourteen consecutive years. For the first time since 2009 his name was absent from the World Championship draw. He did not disappear. He moved to the Seniors circuit and the Modus Super Series — winning the 2026 Modus Seniors Showdown 4-0 over Steve West. He earned a place back at Alexandra Palace and fell 3-2 to Connor Scutt in the first round. Simon Whitlock did not fall off a cliff. He spent ten years sliding down a mountain. 🎯 Subscribe for more untold stories from the world of darts. #darts #dart #dartswc