Premier League history pirouettes into existence this evening as the sport’s most opulent travelling cavalcade makes its long-awaited Belgian debut.
For the first time ever, the glittering roadshow pitches its technicolour tent in Antwerp, where the AFAS Dome will throb with tungsten anticipation. As if that were not enough spectacle for one metropolitan postcode, the city’s footballing aristocracy are simultaneously locking horns with Anderlecht in the Belgian Cup.
It is less a Thursday night and more a full-bodied sporting carnival for the Flemish region – a symphony of floodlights, roars and competitive combustion. And what an orchestration of talent has been assembled.
Eight of the most luminous figures in modern darts stride into battle, and the curtain-raiser is nothing short of celestial. Luke Littler versus Luke Humphries – a rivalry already etched into contemporary folklore. A reprise of the 2024 World Championship final, followed by a sequence of ferociously high-calibre encounters ever since, their meetings have become exhibitions of tungsten virtuosity. Youthful audacity colliding with methodical supremacy. Fire meeting ice. Antwerp could scarcely demand a more incandescent opening act.
Hot on their heels comes the most decorated figure in Premier League annals, Michael van Gerwen, buoyed by his opening-night triumph in Newcastle. The Dutch titan now confronts Josh Rock, one half of Northern Ireland’s reigning World Cup partnership. The Antrim ace will be ravenous to respond after his quarter-final exit to Jonny Clayton on Tyneside – and few tasks test resilience more severely than facing a green-shirted juggernaut in full rhythm.
Clayton himself – the irrepressible Ferret – squares off with Stephen Bunting, another who stumbled at the first hurdle a week ago. Two fervent crowd favourites, one Welsh whirlwind and one Liverpudlian marksman striving to avoid a repeat of last season’s sluggish genesis.
The fourth quarter-final possesses all the architectural integrity of a classic. Gerwyn Price, volcanic and vociferous, meets freshy anointed Dutch number one Gian van Veen. The Iceman was imperious in Players Championship action earlier this week, narrowly denied by another young man from the Netherlands in Wessel Nijman. Van Veen, meanwhile, marked his Premier League inauguration by surging to the final. Momentum, belief and audacity will all travel with him.
There is, admittedly, a faint tinge of local lament. Antwerp is Dimitri Van den Bergh’s home city, and the Dreammaker would have relished a hometown ovation. Mike De Decker’s conspicuous absence from last season’s line-up still lingers and probably burns in memory, and Dimitri aside, the only other former Premier League star Kim Huybrechts remains some distance from recall. Yet absence only sharpens appetite.
Belgium has waited patiently. Tonight, it receives a spectacle worthy of the wait.
2026 BETMGM PREMIER LEAGUE (Night Two)
AFAS Dome, Antwerp, Belgium
Quarter-Finals
Luke Littler v Luke Humphries
Michael van Gerwen v Josh Rock
Jonny Clayton v Stephen Buntin
Gerwyn Price v Gian van Veen
——ENDS—–
Images: Kieran Cleeves / PDC
