Irvine Welsh: 'Darts never died, there's always been a subculture'

'Trainspotting' author and arrows fan Irvine Welsh is known for chronicling the nation's underbelly. His new film looks at the seedier side of professional darts

Irvine Welsh is a passionate Hibernian fan and an all-round lover of sport. He grew up playing football with Gordon Strachan on the streets of Edinburgh



Irvine Welsh is a passionate Hibernian fan and an all-round lover of sport. He grew up playing football with Gordon Strachan on the streets of Edinburgh

The novelist Irvine Welsh, though a well-known and devoted supporter of Hibernian FC, an allegiance he also gives to many of his characters, is not often featured in the sports pages. But on Saturday ITV 4 is screening Good Arrows, the first feature-length film Welsh has written, about the netherworld of professional darts, far removed from the comparative glamour of Alexandra Palace and Frimley Green. This offers the perfect excuse to have a drink with him and talk sport, albeit in the inappropriately swanky environs of Bond Street, central London. A natter with the man who gave us Trainspotting ought really to unfold in a pub underneath a crack den in a defiantly ungentrified part of Leith. At the very least, the drink should be Scotch.

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