IT was a great day for Irish darts as Carlow's Niall Culleton secured his professional PDC Tour Card at Q School in the UK.
The 38-year-old was in superb form at the Arena MK in Milton Keynes, winning six big games on the spin to claim one of the two tour cards up for grabs today.
The Republic of Ireland international player will now rub shoulders with the likes of reigning PDC world champion Luke Littler for the next two years at least when he joins the professional tour over the coming weeks.
And he could be joined on the tour by fellow Carlow man Steve Lennon, who now tops the Q School Order of Merit after he won five of his six games played today.
Culleton gave an early indication of his intentions as he beat three top English players on the trot in Kirk de Ruyter, Sam Jackson and veteran Mervyn King to set up an all Irish clash with Louth's Damien Grimes in the last 16.
In a tight affair, Culleton kept his nerve to win the final two legs of that match in just 27 darts to complete a crucial 6-4 victory.
After defeating England's Sam Spivey 6-3 with an impressive 98.71 average, Culleton progressed to the biggest game of his career against another Englishman, Danny Goddard.
He once again showed his grit by coming from 4-2 down to win four of the last five legs to secure his PDC tour card for the next two years.
Meanwhile, Steve Lennon, who has just lost his tour card, will be hoping to join Culleton back on the tour as he now sits top of the Order of Merit table.
With the top five in the Order of Merit on Sunday also securing tour cards, both Lennon and Offaly's Stephen Rosney, who sits fourth in the table are in a strong position to claim them.
Lennon only just missed out on gaining his tour card today as he lost in his final match against England's Carl Snyed.
However his five wins from earlier in the day means Lennon now sits on 7 points in the table, two points clear of those in the non tour card positions.
Rosney also managed to pick up another two points today, to leave him on 6, which places him fourth in the table.
There will be two more days of Q School action before all 13 tour cards have been handed out.
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