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Mine's a treble - England darts player Viv Dundon. Picture: TERRY WEEDEN (76755-2)

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Viv Dundon isn't the only member of her family to play for England.

Her older brother, Llewellyn, got there first.

"But that was a long time ago," she smiled. "Llewellyn is in his 60s now - he was probably mid-20s when he represented England in clay pigeon shooting competitions."

Viv doesn't clay pigeon shoot. She throws darts. She must be pretty good, too, to be chosen for her country. More than good. She had an "amazing" Easter weekend on her England debut when they took on the rest of Europe. She won. Then, a few days ago, she had another clean sheet during the England v Wales and Scotland championships.

Yet Viv is nothing if not self-effacing. She is almost embarrassed by her success and her talent. There may be cups, certificates and trophies jostling for position in her sitting room, but Viv isn't convinced by them.

"I am not a very confident player," she shrugged. "People say I don't recognise my own skill. Even when I was standing at the oche, playing for England, I wondered what I was doing there."

No-one else did. Clutching the same darts she has used for 28 years - that's the barrels, not the flights - she hit the trebles and doubles as effectively as she does when practising on the dart board in her rather cramped spare bedroom.

Viv made the England team just as she celebrated her 50th birthday. It was a big family affair - her two children Sean, 28, and 26-year-old Tasha, partner Peter (she and her husband have separated) and lots of relatives. Family is important to Viv. So is the cameraderie of darts. She is not in the game for personal glory, although she points out that is "quite nice". She plays the game because she loves it and she loves being with other darts players.

Viv, who now lives in Clacton, was born in Thorpe. She can't remember a time when darts didn't figure in her life. Her parents played darts and so did her first boyfriend. She was 16 when she got the bug.

"I used to go with dad and my boyfriend when they played for The Bell (Thorpe) in the Walton league," she said. "When they weren't playing competition matches they used to play for beer and I joined in. I started winning and the men noticed I was beating them."

She grinned. "Not that I was drinking the beer, of course. Now, yes, I may have a drink during a competition, but gin and tonic, not beer."

A year later, Viv and her mother joined the Thorpe and District Women's League. Darts then was "just good fun". It never crossed her mind she would play for Essex, let alone England. But she must have suspected she had more than a little skill?

"At the beginning, I never looked at it like that," she said. "I was just enjoying myself with people I liked. Darts was so popular because anyone could play. No-one really thought of it beyond the pub and club leagues."

Then, in the 1980s, the BBC brought darts out of the pub and on to the national, then international, stage. Darts went mainstream and the big players became household names. The male dart players, that is. The women's game was not taken as seriously. Not by the sponsors anyway.

By this time Viv had moved to Clacton and was playing in the Clacton Ladies' League. In the late 1980s, the women's super leagues were formed in Essex. Each town had its own super league - Viv was a member of the Clacton Super League - which played each other.

"When I began playing in the super league competition, there were two divisions because there were so many teams - 30 at one point," she said. "Now there are only eight."

That's a rather large drop.

"I suppose for many women travelling across Essex mid-week just became too much," she said. "Also, there are not as many women coming into darts today. When I began playing there were not the things to do as there are now."

Then there are the pubs themselves. Pubs are the grassroots of darts; not, though, for much longer.

"Pub owners are starting to see the dartboard area as dead space. They want more income so are turning those areas over to food," she said. "That isn't helping the game."

In 1989, Viv was chosen to play for Essex. Recently, the British Darts Organisation presented her with a certificate to mark 125 appearances for Essex in the British Inter-County Darts Championships.

"Initially, I played for Essex B team. I had to prove myself, and it wasn't easy. I lost loads of matches," said Viv. "It was so different playing for the county, and not only because of the higher standard. The pressure was greater."

Then she began to win lady-of-the-match awards. This emboldened her and her game just got better and better. Now she has so many of these awards she doesn't know where to put them.

I see her point. There isn't a surface in that sitting room which isn't given over to darts or family. Except the cuddly toy with Arsenal emblazoned across its chest. As a committed Liverpool fan, I couldn't resist asking if she had enjoyed the Champions League quarter-final the other night when Liverpool had wiped the floor - sorry, beaten - Arsenal.

"Oh, I had a darts match," she laughed. "I couldn't watch it."

Convenient.

9:46am Friday 11th April 2008

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