Scotland’s Ross Montgomery, the 54-year old from East Kilbride continues his terrific form in 2017 climbing to 6th in the World and his highest ever BDO World Ranking in over 25 years as a darts professional. The seasoned pro is showing life begins after 50 as he continues to build on his superb 2016 season where he won the Belgium Open and the Jersey Classic.
A finalist in the 2016 Europe Cup pairs along with Alan Soutar they narrowly lost out to the talented Dutch duo of Richard Veenstra and Wesley Harms.
The in-form Scot then made great runs as double runner-up in the Swedish Open and the Czech Open picking up more vital ranking points along the way.
Despite losing out to Richard Veenstra in the first round of the World Championships at Lakeside, Montgomery has remained unshakable reaching the final of the World’s biggest open event, the 2017 Dutch Open, the first major event after the World Championships.
Ross' string of exceptional performances featured wins over Martin Adams, Dean Reynolds and Scott Mitchell in the latter stages.
Despite losing out 3-1 to Mark McGeeney in the final, ‘The Boss’ picked up even more ranking points catapulting him up the BDO Rankings, making him a serious contender for every title.
With runs to the last 32 and the last 16 in the Scottish Open and the Bruges Open respectively in February and April it put Montgomery on the verge of securing a place well inside the top 10 of the BDO.
In Esbjerg, Denmark, only last weekend Montgomery further stamped his authority on the BDO Tour with terrific runs in both the Denmark Open and the Denmark Masters reaching the Semi-Finals on both days, with the latter stages streamed live on the internet.
In the Denmark Open, Montgomery produced some spell-binding performances to defeat Toon Grebe in the last 16 setting up a Quarter-Final with the World number one Glen Durrant where “The Boss” put in yet another terrific display beating current World Champion Durrant in a last-leg decider (4-3). In the Semi-Final Ross faced a tough battle with Scott Mitchell, where the classy 2015 World Champion got the better of Montgomery on this occasion.
[caption id="attachment_20315" align="alignright" width="300"] Click here to view 'The Boss' darts.[/caption]
Just 24 hours later, ‘The Boss' replicated the form which seen him reach the last four in the Denmark to book his place in his second Semi-Final. It was another magnificent weekend overall for ‘The Boss’ where he climbed into sixth place in the BDO rankings, his highest ever World Ranking.
When asked what’s made such a difference over the last few years the forthright Scot said “It’s very hard to pin point one exact thing but my new darts are amazing, I’m also very lucky to have the backing of Red Dragons technical team in this area and their belief in me as a player it’s all helped me really enjoy working hard on my game. My confidence has undoubtedly grown and I really feel like I can compete at the very top level of the game. With such a competitive tour and lots of new young European players coming through I’m enjoying the challenge of living with them all”.