The reigning PDC World Youth Champion Gian van Veen has detonated his way to the summit of Dutch darts, installing himself atop the national hierarchy with a thunderclap heard well beyond Alexandra Palace. His quarter-final scalp of Luke Humphries didn’t just punch a ticket to the semi-finals – it catapulted Van Veen to world number three, nudging him above none other than Michael van Gerwen. A seismic reshuffle. A changing of the guard.
What lends this ascent its cinematic grandeur is the speed. Three years. That’s all it has taken. Wind the clock back to January 2023 and the Poederoijen prodigy was just another hopeful in the throng at PDC European Q-School in Kalkar – one of hundreds clutching dreams and tungsten, praying for a foothold. He’d stumbled twelve months earlier. This time, there would be no mercy from himself. By the narrowest of margins, a ninth-place finish secured a two-year tour card. Invitation accepted. Dance floor entered.
From that moment, the trajectory tilted sharply skyward. It wasn’t long before Van Veen was rubbing shoulders at the business end of major TV events. Later in 2023, he surged to the semi-finals of the European Championship – a tournament that would soon become his personal fiefdom. The performances stacked up. The confidence swelled. The sense of inevitability grew.
The first senior PDC crown arrived at the dawn of 2025 in Leicester, where Van Veen cracked open his account with a Players Championship triumph. A milestone, yes – but merely the prelude. The crescendo came in late October in Dortmund, when the 23-year-old edged Humphries in a white-knuckle epic to lift the European Championship trophy. A first PDC major. A coronation moment. Then, a month later in Minehead, history doubled down: Van Veen retained his World Youth title, becoming only the second player after Dimitri Van den Bergh to win it twice. Elite company.
His unveiling as a Darts World columnist in 2025 may not have played a large role in this rapid rise but we are delighted he chose to communicate directly with a growing army of UK fans who had also anticipated his breakthrough may be imminent.
So his blistering march to the semi-finals of the 2026 PDC World Championship isn’t shock – it’s confirmation. This is a player moving in one direction only. Forward. Faster. Louder. Barring chaos or an act of administrative sorcery, Van Veen will be part of the Premier League Darts next year. The maths may not yet be inked, but the reality is. He has done more than enough. Selection committees adore momentum – and Van Veen has it in industrial quantities.
Now the whispers swell into roars. A final against Luke Littler. Youth versus youth. Power versus poise. If destiny obliges, the young Dutchman could soon be touring Europe not merely as a star, but as World Champion.
From Q-School survivor to national number one in three short, incandescent years – this isn’t just a rise. It’s a takeover.
——ENDS——
Images: PDC
