The fifth Players Championship event of the season – and the first of the year to grace the city of Leicester – generated a statistical peculiarity so exotically rare that it likely sent darts statisticians sprinting towards dusty Pro Tour annals in a state of scholarly hysteria.
When the embers of round one finally cooled, and 64 tungsten specialists remained standing, an astonishing vacuum revealed itself. Not a single current Premier League gladiator was left in the field. The aristocracy had vanished. The velvet rope had been quietly removed.
Granted, context is king. Five members of the Thursday night travelling circus were nowhere near the Mattioli Arena in the first place, either declining the Midlands double header or succumbing to illness. The Premier League roadshow has a habit of draining even the most robust of competitors into a mildly zombified stupor.
Yet three of the Class of 2026 did present themselves – and their visits were brisk, unsentimental and terminal. Jonny Clayton, the current Premier League pacesetter, was unceremoniously shot down in a last leg decider by The Sniper, Conor Scutt.
The Ferret’s World Cup confederate, Gerwyn Price suffered déjà vu of the cruellest variety as Adam Lipscombe – having already dispatched the Iceman in Wigan only a week earlier – repeated the ambush with ruthless efficiency. As for Josh Rock, he careered headlong into a James Hurrell shaped barricade, undone in a shootout that given what else had gone on in the arena, oscillated between theatre and bedlam.
With Luke Littler, Luke Humphries, Gian van Veen and Stephen Bunting having already elected to swerve the Midlands brace – and Michael van Gerwen withdrawing late – round two was rendered utterly devoid of Premier League representation. It may well be an historical anomaly. A day when the sport’s gilded names were reduced to mere footnotes before lunchtime had properly settled.
Naturally, the evacuation of eight elite figures flung the draw open like the doors of a wind lashed cathedral. Opportunity crackled in the air. Yet the vacuum did not alleviate the malaise enveloping Dimitri Van den Bergh and Raymond van Barneveld, whose respective campaigns continue to resemble prolonged exercises in exasperation.
For the multiple major winning duo, it is not merely defeat that should provoke introspection – it is the numbers. The Belgian once again languished beneath the 80 mark, succumbing to Martin Dragt, a competitor who currently doesn’t even possess a tour card. Van Barneveld’s performance was marginally more dignified, though his slightly sub 90 average was only fractionally eclipsed by Richard Veenstra, who proved just that little bit more clinical when it truly mattered.
There was, however, a discernible tremor of encouragement radiating from the Michael Smith axis. The former World Champion appears to be painstakingly reconstructing his once fearsome artillery, bolt by bolt, treble by treble. A late summons to the Poland Darts Open last weekend brought about a couple of confidence boosting wins.
Smith translated that revived conviction seamlessly onto the Pro Tour stage, carving through Tavis Dudeney and Andy Boulton by identical 6-1 scorelines. The latter demolition was underpinned by a ton plus average that throbbed with echoes of his most incendiary pomp. The St Helens slinger did experience a minor oscillation against his namesake Ross, but context is everything – Smudger was operating at stratospheric altitude, uncorking a magnificent 106.38 average that tolerated neither dissent nor negotiation.
Now the intrigue shifts to Wednesday. Should the three remaining Premier League representatives decide to skip the Pro Tour action and head to Belfast early, we could be staring at an even greater slice of absurdity – a Players Championship day completely devoid of the current crop.
That possibility alone may have those stats folk rummaging through the archives once more, desperate to establish whether such a curious anomaly has ever previously occurred.
—–ENDS—–
Images: PDC
