In a sold-out AFAS Live, a bumper session at the World Series Finals was due to happen on the Saturday night. Sixteen darting stars were left in the field and would battle it out in the dangerous format that is best of elven legs: no time for errors at all!
Mike de Decker and Damon Heta got the honor of starting the show. It was a high level start of the night in which De Decker managed to complete a 6-4 victory to reach the quarter-finals on debut.The first Dutchman then entered the stage as Danny Noppert took on Josh Rock.
The same Dutchman also left the stage ten minutes later. Without losing a leg. Whilst averaging a ton. An absolutely insane performance from ‘Rocky’ who averaged 107,36, hit 6 of his 12 darts at double and fired in seven 180’s in the space of six legs for a 6-0 victory.
Luke Humphries took on Kevin Doets in game three of the evening. Humphries was the better player but somehow Doets managed to keep on hanging in there. ‘Cool Hand Luke’ managed to get a 6-4 victory and told me he’s ready to get a first win in this tournament over Michael van Gerwen after two defeats in the previous years.Humphries also had an interesting thing to say about the surprising inclusion of a Eurotour event in Bratislava, Slovakia next year.
The world number one had already played in Bratislava in an exhibition event earlier this year and believed that the crowd was absolutely amazing in that event so to him it was no surprise at all to see Bratislava being added to the European Tour circuit.
Michael van Gerwen then had to fly the flag for The Netherlands and well he did. In a similar game to his first round against Wessel Nijman, both MVG and Rob Cross played high level darts and it was a missed matchdart from Cross in the decider that was followed by an insane 111-finish from Van Gerwen to almost literally raise the roof of the AFAS Live!
Gerwyn Price followed up with a hard fought win over Raymond van Barneveld as the Dutchman upped his first round average by almost ten points to get it over a ton! Price took his chances though and beat Van Barneveld 6-4.
As I asked ‘Gezzy’ for an explaination on always doing well in the World Series events it was very simple: “there is less pressure when there’s no ranking money to be earned!” Chris Dobey missed a lot of doubles in the next match but it did not matter as he comfortably saw off a completely out of sorts Cameron Menzies 6-1.
‘Hollywood’ admitted it would have to go better tomorrow in a quarterfinal matchup against Price as Dobey told me himself his record against ‘The Iceman’ isn’t to write home about.Another mouthwatering tie followed between Luke Littler and Jonny Clayton. The defending champion once again got put under big pressure but once again took his chances when he had to and beat Jonny Clayton 6-4.
Littler told me it were indeed those crucial chances that made the difference against both Clayton and Simon Whitlock back in round 1.
The evening was ended by a 6-4 win for Ross Smith over Dave Chisnall. ‘Smudger’ admitted he was due a big run here in Amsterdam and will be determined to get revenge over his deciding leg defeat against Littler last year as Smith plays ‘The Nuke’ in the last eight tomorrow.
A total of fourteen interviews done and two amazing days of darts. Just the one thing to do now: crown our 2025 champion and have the winners interview.
Bring on the Final day!
—–Ends—-
Words and Images: Wim Blokpoel
