FIRST a lovely breakfast at the hotel and it was time to return to the Autotron for day 2 of the Dutch Darts Championship.
Time for the second round games, and being able to stay in the press room all day which was ideal.
The day started with Jeffrey de Graaf beating Stephen Bunting 6-3 as the Dutch Swede reached the third round on the Eurotour for the first time in six years!
In our interview De Graaf said he was over the moon to finally reach round 3 again and is also looking forward to pairing up with Oscar Lukasiak at the World Cup for Sweden!
Talking about the World Cup, Luke Woodhouse then ruined the World Cup chances for Daryl Gurney as he beat him 6-4 which confirmed Brendan Dolan will pair up with Josh Rock for Northern Ireland.
Ritchie Edhouse then edged out a disappointing Damon Heta 6-5 after which defending champion Dave Chisnall did perform very well in a 6-2 win over Niels Zonneveld.
Debutant Marvin van Velzen had another class performance but this time it was in a 4-6 defeat to Jonny Clayton. Jermaine Wattimena then edged out Ricardo Pietreczko 6-5 in a bizarre, or in his own words rollercoaster, game.
Wattimena said he wanted to close it out much earlier following his 3-0 lead but a win is a win.
Danny Noppert then was just another Dutchman to win 6-5 against Andrew Gilding in a battle of UK Open Champions. ‘The Freeze’ had to travel to the other side of the country but told us it was still a home crowd for him.
He is also looking forward to represent The Netherlands along with Michael van Gerwen, who is a good friend of him as well.
In the last afternoon match Ryan Searle beat James Wade 6-3 as I rushed myself to the supermarket for a salad. Thankfully no traffic jam this time, giving me enough time to eat my diner before the evening session started.
That evening’s session started with a superb performance from Chris Dobey as he whitewashed Moreno Blom 6-0. Gerwyn Price then made it back to back whitewashes as he bageled Mickey Mansell before Josh Rock silenced the crowd with a 6-3 win over Dirk van Duijvenbode.
Michael van Gerwen whitewashed a nervous Kevin Doets, but only wanted to give an interview to Viaplay unfortunately.
Martin Schindler then beat Brendan Dolan 6-4 and the German number one told me it is always difficult to play against Dolan. He was very happy about winning on the European Tour and said it was an undescribable feeling to win that event, which also confirmed his spot in basically any major this year.
Cameron Menzies then impressed again with a 6-3 win over Peter Wright, and told me he hopes Wright will keep on playing for a long time although him retiring would give Menzies a potential World Cup spot.
Menzies also mentioned getting a lot of abuse online just for being the way he is, which is absolutely terrible. He is also thinking about quitting his job and becoming a full time pro.
Dimitri van den Bergh then played Ross Smith and led 4-1 before Ross Smith hit a nine-darter!! Sadly I was in the press room so missed seeing it live. Much people in the crowd did not seem to notice it either though as Van den Bergh said it was the most silent nine-darter he had ever witnessed.
Final game of the night saw Gian van Veen edge out Dom Taylor 6-5 in another thriller where the crowd truly got involved. Van Veen told me the crowd chanting his name gave him goosebumps and it was an experience he never witnessed before.
After another late night travel I reached my hotel room and went to bed to get some rest for the final day!
—–Ends—–
