Finland’s Teemu Harju has fired a warning shot across the Nordic and Baltic darting scene after storming to victory in the inaugural PDC Nordic & Baltic Championship, flattening Sweden’s Edwin Torbjornsson 8–2 in a one-sided final that looked over before the ink had dried on the scoreboard.
Copenhagen played host to the region’s top 24 tungsten talents across two days of action, and by the end, Harju was holding the Jan Hoffman Trophy with the sort of quiet satisfaction of a man who knew his destiny.
The 33-year-old Finn saved his best stuff for the final day, brushing aside Par Riihonen, Cor Dekker, Johan Engstrom, and finally Torbjornsson, whose resistance lasted about as long as a Michael van Gerwen haircut. The Swede struck first, nicking the opening leg, but that was about it for suspense. Harju responded by detonating four 180s in five legs to open up a 5–1 lead, turning the final into a one-man showcase.
Torbjornsson managed to scrape another leg in the seventh, but any thoughts of a comeback were swiftly buried under a barrage of tidy checkouts – 80, 81, and 78 – as Harju closed the deal with a tidy 94.36 average and the sort of clinical finishing that made the rest of the field wish they’d stayed home.
Harju’s campaign began with a thumping 6–1 win over Riihonen, followed by a 6–4 victory over Dekker – the same Dekker who’d made a semi-final on the European Tour just a week earlier in Basel. In the semis, Harju had to survive a spirited comeback from Johan Engstrom, who fired in legs of 12, 12, and 14 darts to level from 6–3 down before Harju restored order in the decider.
If Harju’s route was efficient, Torbjornsson’s was anything but. The Swede seemed determined to give his fans value for money, surviving four deciding-leg thrillers en route to the final. He beat Niels Heinsoe, Valters Melderis, Anton Ostlund, and Daniel Larsson – each time flirting dangerously with defeat. In fact, against Melderis he overturned a 5–4 deficit, while in both of his last two matches he survived match darts to squeeze through.
Larsson himself produced arguably the performance of the tournament, averaging 103.36 to knock out top seed Andreas Harrysson in a high-quality quarter-final. Elsewhere, Lithuanian veteran Darius Labanauskas and Sweden’s number two Oskar Lukasiak both saw their campaigns end in the last 16 – proving that even the region’s big hitters can get caught cold in Copenhagen.
Victory in the new championship normally guarantees a spot at the Paddy Power World Darts Championship, but Harju had already booked his place at Ally Pally through the Nordic & Baltic ProTour rankings. That means Oskar Lukasiak, who finished third in the standings, now grabs the spare golden ticket – joining Harrysson and Harju as the Nordic & Baltic trio heading for London in December.
Harju, for his part, looked utterly unfazed by the whole thing. It was just another day, another trophy, and another confirmation that he’s the man to beat north of the Baltic. For the rest, there’s always next year – or as they’ll probably call it now, The Harju Era: Part Two.
Last 16`
Andreas Harrysson 6-3 Viktor Tingstrom
Daniel Larsson 6-2 Jonas Masalin
Anton Ostlund 6-2 Marko Kantele
Edwin Torbjornsson 6-5 Valters Melderis
Teemu Harju 6-1 Par Riihonen
Cor Dekker 6-5 Darius Labanauskas
Mindaugas Barauskas 6-2 Oskar Lukasiak
Johan Engstrom 6-0 Andreas Hyllgaardhus
Quarter-Finals
Daniel Larsson 6-4 Andreas Harrysson
Edwin Torbjornsson 6-5 Anton Ostlund
Teemu Harju 6-4 Cor Dekker
Johan Engstrom 6-5 Mindaugas Barauskas
Semi-Finals
Edwin Torbjornsson 7-6 Daniel Larsson
Teemu Harju 7-6 Johan Engstrom
Final
Teemu Harju 8-2 Edwin Torbjornsson
—–ENDS—–
Images: PDC Europe / Paul Targyik
