Female darts star Deta Hedman has withdrawn from the Denmark Open after refusing to take on a transgender opponent and has now called for a blanket ban on trans women in women’s events.

Darts legend Hedman, 64, had been drawn against Noa-Lynn van Leuven – the defending champion – at the quarter-final stage, but forfeited her chance to go any further in the tournament in which the winner takes home prize money of 12,000 DKK (£1,400).

Initial reports claimed that Hedman had withdrawn due to illness, but she soon set the record straight on Twitter:

‘No fake illness, I said I wouldn’t play a man in a ladies event’.

She later told German newspaper Bild:

‘I’m not playing against a man in a women’s event.’

You may be thinking – darts! The sports that requires nothing more than an arm and an eye to play, where there is no biological advantage for men or women. Turns out however, that men do have better hand-eye coordination than women, and so maybe van Leuven does have an advantage over her opponents. I don’t know, I’m not a darts expert. But the core issue seems to be about a trans woman taking the place of a biological woman in the competition, and that’s what Hedman isn’t happy with.

Hedman has criticised rules that allow transgender women to compete in women’s sport for some time and seems to have plenty of support on that front, including from former US swimmer Riley Gaines, who offered to pay for any financial hit Hedman took by withdrawing from the competition. Hedman, however, insisted that wasn’t necessary:

Jamaican-born Hedman stressed that she had ‘no problem’ with transgender people but found it ‘wrong since day one’ that trans individuals could take part in women’s ranked events:

‘For many months I’ve struggled with transgenders playing in the women’s world ranked events.

‘I have thought this is wrong since day one, I have no problem with transgenders in life… Noa is a really nice person, nobody is disputing that at all… it’s just my belief and many other women players’ belief that trans shouldn’t be in women’s ranked events.’

It’s a tricky one really. Obviously it’s important to protect women’s spaces and maintain the integrity of women’s sports, but at the same time we’re also trying to make the world a more inclusive place for trans people. We’ve said this before on our blogs – but how about XX and XY categories where you compete under your sex chromosome type, no matter what gender you identity as? Seems like this would keep everyone happy, but I’m sure someone would end up moaning about that too.

The saga continues…

For the anti-trans MMA star who is offering to fight 10 trans men in a row, click HERE. Now that would be interesting.