ARROWS ace Dee Bateman is ready to live the dream and avoid having her heart broken as she takes on the world on Sunday.

The Barrow checkout queen will battle one of game’s greats in the first round of the BDO World Championships at Lakeside.

Bateman plays nine-times world champion Trina Gulliver in her opening contest, looking to better her only other appearance on the sport’s biggest stage.

She was beaten by eventual champion Anastasia Dobromyslova on her Lakeside bow in 2008 and has had to wait eight years to reach the finals again.

Her battle with Gulliver provides her with the perfect chance to prove she is worthy of her place among the game’s elite and the former world number three is determined to take it.

“I’m putting in a lot of hard work,” said Morrison’s supermarket worker Bateman, whose ‘Checkout’ nickname reflects both her day job and her prowess with the arrows.

“I’ve been getting home from work and having two hours on the practice board before I go to bed. I’m getting to bed at 1am, but if you don’t put the hours in, you don’t get the rewards.

“Hard work does pay off in the end and hopefully I’ve done enough to get me through the first round.

“It’s going to be nerve-wracking regardless of who you play – and I’m up against a nine-times world champion in Trina, who is a class act.

“This is a dream for me. This is where dreams come true and hearts are broken. Hopefully my dream can continue into the next round.”

The first round match is scheduled to start at 7.15pm on Sunday, and will be televised on BT Sports.

The Vic Tavern, where Bateman plays her darts in the Barrow and District Mixed Darts League, will be showing the game on their big screen, with team-mates, friends and supporters backing her bid to be the best in the world.

Bateman is intent on doing them proud, and spends all her breaks during her shifts at Morrisons – who have given her time off from work to travel to Lakeside – practising.

She has been unable to take part in a competitive match for three weeks, but still feels she has it in her to repeat her display the last time she met Gulliver, in Blackpool in the World Darts Trophy two years ago.

That match ended in victory for the Barrow player, who has been sponsored by Morrisons and Univisor for her title tilt, and she said: “I’m looking for a repeat result, but I’m hoping to play better than I did back then.

“I’ve got a feeling I will have to play better. Trina will have been on the practice board a lot. I’m expecting a tough game.”

If Bateman defeats Gulliver, she is in line to meet top seed and defending champion Lisa Ashton in the quarter-finals.

That would be another big task, but the multiple- Evening Mail champion is happy to be able to even consider such a match-up.

“I was starting to think I wouldn’t reach the World Championships again,” said Bateman, who thanked her work colleagues and customers for their support in the build-up. “But when I played the first match in the qualifiers, I just felt like a different person and that I could do it. Round after round, I just got better and better.

“The hard work started there, because the last thing you want to do is play in the biggest tournament in the world and not perform. I can’t allow that to happen.”