Following last week's largely terrible opening night in Ireland, the Premier League Darts roadshow heads to Cardiff in what is a long overdue return for a Welsh player to actually compete in the tournament. 2011 was the last time it happened, when Mark Webster went down 8-1 to Adrian Lewis and averaged 87. Sadly, succeeding the likeable left-hander is a rugby obsessed roided up shortarse.
Starting the evening though are two youngsters who had differing starts to the PL with Michael Smith up against Northern Ireland's Daryl Gurney. Bully Boy recovered from 5-1 down to beat crippled master Gando last time out, while Superchin let a 6-3 lead slip to draw against RVB. Both men are known for switching off in matches so this could be scrappy.
Night 1's star performer is up next against the World Champion with Simon Whitlock playing Rob Cross. The Wizard's superb 106 average and 88% finishing saw him win the first game of the tournament against the Gentle, while Voltage was railroaded by MVG. This should be the perfect platform for Cross to finally stabilise following a hectic past few days in the UK Open qualifiers, but the Aussie is always unpredictable.
A repeat of last year's final follows with Michael van Gerwen against Peter Wright. It wasn't vintage van Gerwen last week against Cross but the 7-2 scoreline put him top, while Snakebite threw away his own 5-1 lead to draw with the night's star attraction.
Said attraction is of course Gerwyn Price, and assuming Gary Anderson isn't still injured with his bad back, this should be a tricky game for him. When the Scot can be bothered, he is unstoppable, but the back pains may play their part.
The evening ends with a repeat of one of the best games from the Champions League of Darts with Raymond van Barneveld against Mensur Suljovic. Neither man recorded a win last week so it's vital that one of them gets to 7 legs even at this early stage.
Coverage starts from 7:00pm UK time on Sky Sports Action.
>Tonight's fixtures (7:00pm start, all matches best of 12 legs) Michael "Snackpot 2.0" Smith v Daryl "Sweet C4-line" Gurney Rob "BAuLDtism" Cross v STRAYA MvGOAuTism v Snakeshite Gerwyn "Gurning" Price v Gary "Big Game Counter" Anderson Barney v Mensur "DIE MEISTER, DIE BESTEN" Suljovic
Away from the Premier League, the first 3 UK Open qualifiers at the weekend saw three days of action to determine who gets to Minehead at the start of March. Someone who will not be there is madcap Scot Cameron Menzies, who stupidly failed to register for any of the qualifiers.
Friday saw the continued decline of Adrian Lewis in a scarcely believable incident with Spain's newest Tour Card holder Jose Justicia in a quarter-final match that saw the Stokie emerge a 6-5 winer. Complaining of a creaky oche throughout the match, Jackpot took matters into his own hands by swearing and manhandling the man from Alicante and then attempted to choke him at the end. If you don't believe me, watch these: youtube.com/watch?v=Z1lQssZaPgM + youtube.com/watch?v=p2w_RwuEfG0 + twitter.com/twitter/statuses/959510438911315970 - naturally, the DRA got involved and Lewis was banned from the next 2 qualifiers before being fined £3,000 and receiving a suspended ban. MVG won in the final against Bully Boy having beaten both iterations of Snackpot in successive games, hitting 170 and a double bull 120 in the final.
MVG then had an incident of his own in Saturday's final against that little rascal Darren Webster. In the third leg of the match, Demolition Manlet hit a 140 that had a dart fall out but was counted as having being in. MVG protested and held the match up for about 5 minutes before play resumed and he won back-to-back UK Open Qualifiers.
However, it wasn't going to be 3 from 3 for MVG as his 23 match unbeaten run in 2018 was ended on Sunday by that other big name darting Michael in St. Helens' Smith who hit his own double bull 120 in their quarter-final. Blubby triumphed in UKQ3 with a whitewash of Austria's Zoran Lerchbacher in the final.
One man who had a woeful 3 days was Rob Cross, who crashed out in the first round successively to Corey Cadby, Jamie Hughes and Ryan Meikle to enter this weekend's qualifiers on £0.
Luis Ward
mfw THE VOLTAGE will win the worlds then go back to where he came from at a pub getting $7 prize money in the span of 2 years
Justin Cooper
>the new John Part
Jonathan Sullivan
Been absolutely stoked for /180/ this week following Aidy's meltdown last Friday. Between that and Rob Cross being unable to win a match ever again, the comedy is pretty great in the PDC right now even if the match quality was balls last week.
Ready for Gando to grin his way to a 7-3 loss tonight?
Hunter Gomez
Has Lewis gone full JUST mode? Is this the end of his career?
Daniel Lee
>Rob "JUST" Cross THE NEW PHIL TAYLOR PEOPLE SAID PFFFHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Jace Parker
I mean one thing he has going for him is he's been so trash for two years he's barely defending any money.
Ethan Ross
Cross supposedly averaged about 100 last weekend, so probably just unlucky not to pick up any money.
Asher Fisher
Tour card holders not entering the first two players championships:
Kevin Burness Royden Lam Robert Marijanovic John Norman Jnr Mensur Suljovic
Connor Mitchell
Yozza averaged 105 in that match from what I read.
Should have beaten Meikle though. Had 4 darts to win it and missed the lot.
Lincoln Ortiz
Ha ha, time for /180/. Being sick sucks only half as hard with a night of PL darts up ahead.
John Bailey
They should have just stripped Lam of his Tour Card.
He hasn't played a ranking event in over a year. I know about the travel and that but he's got zero commitment.
Eli Perry
what do you guys think about the new dartconnect system? it's so great but it also looks ancient
also do any of you watch the floor matches through pdc tv or other means?
Nathan Cook
Thought he mostly plays E-darts anyway? So why even worry about tour cards?
Ryan Young
I always wondered if it was maybe a sponsorship thing with him and the Japanese lads who get cards but don't bother playing PCs.
Chase Perry
Takes a Tour Card away from a more local player who would use it. If you're not prepared to commit, you shouldn't bother.
Could be.
At least the PDC starting their own Asian Tour should end that shit.
Nathaniel Lewis
And we're on now.
Jonathan Ortiz
>4000 fans Looks half-empty.
Liam Richardson
THE ABSOLUTE STATE OF FERRY BOY
Adam Butler
>he's on painkillers that are permitted
Kevin Kelly
>this terrible montage
Evan Stewart
SHUT UP AND EAT WITH ME
Isaiah Long
Truly horrible.
Daniel Long
SO GOOD SO GOOD SO GOOD
Sebastian White
THAT 124 ON THE BULL
CHIN SEETHING
Colton Robinson
>3-0 Always great to see Chin getting raped. Now don't choke on us, Blubby.
Justin Hall
BRAVO
>blubby
Ian Mitchell
>fatpot jr
Liam Davis
GJGE Blubby. Not that we expected anything else.
Daniel Johnson
Those 2 180s were absurd.
Jackson Allen
Stuck so tight together, it looked like a single dart in the board
Justin Johnson
>le chin
Asher Turner
...
Chase Robinson
>Alicante paella is fucking shit!
Jaxson Rodriguez
>German fan holding up a sign saying "SCHEISS HSV" >Security takes it off him
Isaiah Lewis
>this promo
Ian Williams
>"Salads are great, Adrian"
Brandon Gray
Translation?
Gabriel Parker
Shit HSV
>new Cross montage Better than the previous one.
Leo Myers
HSV (Hamburg football club) sucks.
Liam Morales
>australian_national_anthem.mp3
Jordan Ross
>JoJo's Access All Areas
Jelle clearly watching at home.
Caleb Williams
>ominous intro >followed by jobber song Imagine sharing Deta Hedman's walk-on.
Jacob Wilson
I'm thinking of creating a twitter account just to write "bring back electric six" every fucking day.
Ayden Turner
"@RobCross180 @stuartpykesport: Bring Back Electric Six"
Jacob Reed
Really hope that the G.O.A.T. a.k.a. The Wizard whitewashes Cross and makes him crawl back to that hole where he came from.
Connor Turner
>Whitlock >GOAT No Komula, no!
Austin Flores
Yeah, Cross literally went from the best walk-on song to the worst walk-on song.
Nicholas Bennett
>that abysmal third dart
Kevin Wilson
>no score
Blake Richardson
>35 >Oom ranking in 2 years
Jacob Green
Will Rob Cross ever win another darts match?
Gabriel Rogers
>the only players Cross has beaten this year are both from Stoke
Joshua Cook
>Stuart Pyke suggesting Anderson went from "strength to strength" after winning the Worlds in 2015 >has only won 1 non-Worlds major since
Parker Phillips
>dartconnect I'm using pro-darter.com
Gavin Gray
The Wizard, my man
Adam Parker
>Rob Dross Like Kirk Shepherd, only slightly better.
Colton Ward
...
Matthew Edwards
If Cross has a terrible second season and it all goes pear-shaped in 2019 as well, he could easily vanish off the circuit as quickly as he appeared.
Ryder Kelly
Where the fuck is Hastings anyways?
Evan Jenkins
Taylor cursed him I think
Christopher Young
Rob Dross little run status: >[ ] Not Had >[x] Had
Dominic Evans
Embarrassing.
Wyatt Edwards
>when Pheel's retirement eternally cursed the last man to beat him
Lincoln Campbell
Huelocausted.
I don't think anyone would have thought Rob Cross would only have won 3 legs in the first 2 weeks.
Gavin Butler
Imagine MvG getting his worlds title stolen every year by another current sensation, who goes to shit immediatly afterwards.
Austin Diaz
Lmao the little Humpty Dumpty impersonator from Hastings almost got whitewasted by The Wizard
Aaron Mitchell
Whitlock is Australian
Bentley Baker
>mfw Shitlock rolls two weeks in a row
Jordan Baker
At least Cross can fuck off now so we can focus on the proper future GOAT of the game.
Daniel Turner
Good eye, mate.
Matthew Price
>bad shoop of that girl from lord of the rings with Cross head stabbing the dragon riding ring ghost with Taylel head
Landon Bell
That filename
Adrian Wright
Big if true.
Justin Long
>Beat MVG >Turn to shit
Sound familiar lads?
Luke Thompson
Fat fuck Cadby isn't going to win shit in the PDC.
Caleb Powell
>Cross -11 after 2 weeks
Cooper Reyes
>Rob's got a bit of a hangover
You'd know all about that Si.
Nicholas Powell
Next up:
>le change darts man vs. autism personified
Eli Sullivan
>Don't stop the midlife crisis...
Parker Butler
>dressing up as a circus big top
Brandon Adams
>classily dressed walk on girls not allowed >women clad in skimpy pants prancing around on stage is ok
Samuel Wright
>17 dart leg to start
Justin Johnson
Forgot how funny Snakeshite's choke was in the final of this last year.
