Martin Schindler forced to pull dart out of his foot as UK Darts Open board gets ‘violent’

MARTIN SCHINDLER was booted out of the UK Open – after being nailed by one of his own darts!

The German saw an arrow fly back from the board and embed itself in his FOOT.

The PDC reckoned it was “the most violent bounce-out you will ever see!”

The sport’s chiefs even joked: “Who said darts wasn’t a dangerous sport?!”

Schindler safely extracted the tip of steel from the heel of his shoe.

But although his dart had launched that surprise ‘comeback’ against him, the World No 23 himself couldn’t do the same thing against Jonny Clayton.

Schindler crashed out 10-4 to leave his Welsh conqueror now facing 2023 world champion Michael Smith in the quarter-finals at Minehead.

It was an impressive feat of Clay – after the impaled foot of Schindler!

But at least the 28-year-old handled the bizarre scare brilliantly.

Schindler tried to lurch out of the way as the rogue arrow ricocheted back towards him.

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And although darts success is more commonly based on a matter of millimetres, on this occasion it came down to feet and flinches.

He twisted round to see the arrow sticking proudly up from the back of his footwear.

As Schindler bent down to take it out, he burst into a big smile.

He then gestured to the crowd to show he was uninjured.

That enabled Clayton to let rip a huge grin – as both players shared a look from an experience probably neither of them will ever see again.

Fans were happy to put their ‘dart and sole’ into making mischief out of the incident.

One came up with a great new rule.

He posted: “If it comes back to you and you catch it/it’s sticking in you that should make you able to throw it again.”

And another also joked there should be at least an amendment in the rule-book.

He wrote: “That’s got to be worth points!”

Perhaps they’ve nailed it with their ideas.