Josh Rock vows he won't be 'a one season wonder' after breakthrough campaign

The 21-year-old from Broughshane made a special guest appearance on the SSE Arena stage to collect his PDC Best Newcomer and Youth Player of the Year awards as this year’s version of the Premier League, which features eight of the top players in the world, and kicked off last Thursday night.

‘Rocky’ had a breakthrough year in 2022, securing his tour card, winning five PDC tour titles and also being crowned World Youth Champion.

In the Grand Slam, he hit a nine-darter against Michael van Gerwen and on his debut at the World Championship he was one set away from reaching the quarter-final, eventually losing to Welshman Johnny Clayton after winning three matches to reach the last 16.

Rock has accelerated through the world rankings, shooting up to 36th after only one season in the PDC.

“It has been a fantastic year getting Youth Player of the Year and Newcomer of the Year, I think I deserved both to be honest after the year I had and I’m well happy,” said Rock.

The Northern Ireland player beat Jose Justicia, Callan Rydz and world No.9 Nathan Aspinall at the World Championship before facing Clayton and it was a case on mixed emotions for ‘Rocky’ on his Alexandra Palace debut.

“I was a wee bit disappointed because I missed too many doubles at my favourite double, that’s what happens in this game. It is obviously darts and you have to except it but I was still happy to get into the last 16,” he said.

“I would say it was [about] experience because Johnny was hitting his doubles but if I was hitting my doubles, and no disrespect to Johnny he is a fantastic player, but I think he knew in the first set when I was averaging 112 I was going to blow and it was looking that way until I started missing doubles, but that is the game of darts.”

Rock says his Ally Palace experience will stand him in good stead as he moves forward in his career.

“It was a big learning curve not to rely on your favourite double every time, I have learnt from my mistakes so we will see what happens this year,” he said.

After a sensational first year, he is now determined to avoid ‘second season syndrome’, vowing: “I’ll not be a one-hit wonder, I am just looking forward to this year and getting into everything and making sure I won’t make a mistake.”

Michael Smith is the only player in PDC history to win the World Youth Championship and go on to lift the senior crown but it took him a decade to achieve the feat, and Rock hopes to accomplish the feat much sooner.

“Hopefully I won’t be waiting that long but you never know in this game,” added Rock, who also has aspirations of playing in the Premier League.

Attending the opening event in Belfast has whetted his appetite to be involved in all 16 weeks of the competition next year.

Rock said: “It felt amazing and I just got the taste for it to be in the Premier League in front of my home crowd.”