SCOTT Mitchell admits he is ahead of schedule on the board during his early months as a PDC player, but his progress was almost scuppered by some unfortunate timekeeping off it.

The Bransgore ace won his tour card to compete on the professional, lucrative circuit back in February.

And the 51-year-old has made a strong start, currently inside the top 60 of the ProTour order of merit as well as sitting 88th on the two-year rolling main PDC rankings.

He reached his first quarter-final during a Players Championship event in Milton Keynes in March, before following that up with back-to-back runs to the last eight during a run of Super Series competitions in Germany.

Many players opted not to travel to Niedernhausen for the events due to COVID-19 concerns, travel restrictions and isolation rules put in place.

Mitchell won £5,000 for his exploits on his European trip, but he himself very nearly did not even make it to the oche for the competitions.

"There were problems going over," Scotty Dog told the Daily Echo.

"I don’t know how many travelled from the UK, probably 80 or 90. We were talking about it when we got there and we all had different experiences. It wasn’t like there was one standard, set pattern for the travel. So it was very confusing.

"I, myself, had to go to Heathrow and I had my PCR COVID test done. I thought, I’ll be there a couple of hours early to make sure in case anything goes wrong and I went to check in and they wouldn’t let me go on the flight, because my PCR would be one hour out of time when I landed in Germany.

"I didn’t allow for the hour extra to go over to Germany, for the time difference!"

Fortunately, there was a backup plan.

Mitchell explained: "They said ‘look, all is not lost, if you back this PCR test up with a lateral flow test’. So I then had to go off and have a lateral flow, that cost me 60 quid at the airport and then I’m sat in the chair and the bloke said ‘I recognise you, you play darts don’t you?’.

"I said ‘yeah, I’m a bit of a techno tit as well, can you just get on with this and get this done, because I’ve got to wait for the result!’. And the guy said, ‘it’s fine Scotty, I’ll sort it out’.

"So he took me in and did it there and then. He took the test out of my mouth and tested it and said ‘you’re clear’, but the trouble was I had to have it certificated.

"He said ‘yeah, that’s what you pay for, I’ve got to put it through, just wait outside’. I went and waited outside, he went and got it all printed off for me. I was so lucky and I just made the flight by 10 minutes."

When he did arrive in Germany, it proved to be arguably Mitchell's most impressive week on the board this season.

"Two quarter-finals, which was great," he said.

"Losing to Dimitri van den Bergh in one, when he went on and won it and lost to Dirk van Duijvenbode in one, who went on and won it. I think I hold the record now for losing to the winner the most times out of anybody this year!

"My thought process is if the winners keep beating me, then one day I’m going to be the winner.

"I do, honestly, I feel I’m getting better. I don’t think I’m getting worse. I think with age I’m getting better and more relaxed about it all. Things that used to get to me five years ago don’t even touch me now. That just comes with experience and age."

He added: "There is so much money available through the ProTour or the Super Series that you can slide up and down those rankings as quick as anything.

"You rest on your laurels at your own peril really. It’s like yep, that’s done, you’ve got them on the board. I’m doing really well, better than I expected to be honest this early.

"But I know that with that sometimes you’ve got to go around the corner and you’ve got to have the dark phase as well. But I won’t go looking for them, I’m going to try and stay on a high."

After a strong showing in Germany, Mitchell returned and was forced into a 10-day period of self-quarantine.

And as someone who spends most of his day out working on his Dorset farm when not competing in the PDC, Mitchell struggled to keep himself entertained when he did get back from his travels.

"When I got home, my children, they were still working, they had to stay out of the rooms that I was in," he said.

"They had to isolate themselves away from me as well. So we had to kind of cut the house in half for two weeks.

"I got terribly bored.

"There’s only so much you can watch on telly. There’s only so much practice you can do.

"Up to about May 7 I was practicing really well every day. Then once the isolation went, since then it’s been trying to catch up with the work.

"Tough times, but there’s a lot of people out there in worse places. The be all and end all is it’s just a game of darts, it’s not life and death."

After three wins from seven games in Milton Keynes last week, Mitchell returns to action in the next round of Super Series events at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry early next month, looking to snatch a World Matchplay qualification spot.