Mansell bounces back from hand surgery to retain Tour card

NATHAN Rafferty and Mickey Mansell achieved their aim of gaining a PDC Tour card for the next two years at Q-School over the weekend.

Coalisland’s Rafferty, who reached the final of the World Youth Championship last season, achieved the feat for the first time after six years of trying by reaching the final of the last day’s play, while Mansell, who has held a card since 2011, produced consistent displays all weekend to finish inside the top 10 overall to retain his place at darts top table.

And while Rafferty was justifiably elated to have achieved his goal, Mansell was a relieved man because not only had he kept his card, but he did so after taking a huge gamble on his playing career by having surgery on his hand just 70 days before Q-School began.

The ‘Clonoe Cyclone’ suffers from Dupuytren’s contracture (also called Dupuytren’s disease), the same as Love Actually star, Bill Nighy. The illness is an abnormal thickening of the skin in the palm of your hand at the base of your fingers. This thickened area may develop into a hard lump or thick band. Over time, it can cause one or more fingers to curl (contract), or pull sideways or in toward your palm.

Mansell has had the disease in his right hand for some time, but it hasn’t deteriorated to the degree that it did over the course of 18 months in his left, his throwing hand.

Having battled through the issue with his hand over the past year, during which time it had got worse and worse, Mansell realised he needed to act and that surgery was required.

He was due to go under the knife this week, on January 18th, but fortunately he was offered a cancellation late last year which he decided to take.

It wasn’t an easy decision to make, however, as it meant missing out on the Players Championship and the World Championships, but it was a calculated gamble.

“I had to weigh it up to miss out on those tournaments because qualifying for one of them would probably have kept me on the tour but my hand was never going to get any better,” he explained.

“It was continually getting worse so I bit the bullet and hoped that come Q-School things would be back to normal and the rest of the year would be the way forward.

“The date for the operation was 18th of January so instead of going for an operation I’m preparing for the new season, so it has worked out.

“It was a gamble and it was a massive risk to take because I knew that if I had tried to qualify for the World Championships and I didn’t make them that I had an operation coming up so I’d have missed Q-School which meant I’d have a year off all darts but it worked. I could have qualified for those tournaments and held onto my card but then I’d have missed the first four to six weeks of the new season and I’d be under pressure for the rest of the year to hold my card.”

As well as risking his Tour card by deciding to go under the knife to fix his hand, Mansell was also potentially risking his playing career, which is something he didn’t take lightly.

“With the operation, there was no guarantees when they start cutting into nerves and for me, that feel and that touch I need with my darts was very important and that was probably the only doubt I had,” he explained.

“I had accepted that if it didn’t work that would be the end and around Christmas when I knew everyone else was practicing for the World Championships and practicing for Q-School, I was sitting with my hand in a cast so it was definitely mental torture for three or four weeks.

“It was never about making me a better darts player, the hand needed fixed and that was that.”

Having managed to adapt his way of holding and throwing darts fairly regularly over the last 18 months, during which time he landed two nine-darters, Mansell has had to revert back to his more natural approach since the surgery.

However, he hasn’t had much time to come to terms with it. Q-School started just 70 days from he last played and having spent 50 of those days rehabilitating and recovering from Covid, it’s fair to say, his preparations for Q-School were far from ideal.

“I went for the operation and for 50 days I was in rehab, I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t bend my fingers because I was in a splint,” he explained.

“So I got down to about 20 days when I started just before Christmas when I had done a couple of days to see how it would work and it definitely wasn’t good.

“I then got Covid and that brought me back to the start, so I really only had about three weeks practice.”

Even with only a handful of weeks’ practice under his belt, Mansell decided to take his chance at Q-School and he’s delighted that he did now that he has achieved his aim and can look forward to another season on the PDC tour.

“From my perspective it’s more relief than anything,” he admitted.

“I’ve been on the tour for 11 years so you know what you’re missing out on and the opportunities that come with it.

“When you’re on it and you know the ins and outs of how it works it’s a massive thing to be missing out on.

“A lot of things came together in a very short space of time, so t’s definitely a lot of pressure relieved more than anything.”