Quarter-final for Van der Voort at Players Championship 11

Wim Blokpoel - Yesterday the last of three pro tours of the weekend was played in Barnsley: Players Championship 11. After 2 Dutch winners, it wasn’t a hattrick unfortunately.

Purmerend’s Vincent van der Voort survived multiple matchdarts in round 1, as he edged out Simon Whitlock 6-5. In round 2 VVDV had another 6-5 win, this time over Martin Lukeman. In the last 32 The Dutch Destroyer caused an upset as he beat World Number One and World Champion Peter Wright 6-4!!! Van der Voort also averaged 95,9 in that big win. Into the last 16, where he played Steve Beaton and Van der Voort comfortably won it 6-2. A quarter-final for Van der Voort, but he lost 2-6 to Dave Chisnall who averaged 100,5. Still a grrat run for Vincent van der Voort after a disappointing start of 2022.

Ron ‘The Bomb’ Meulenkamp edged out Stephen Bunting 6-5 in the last 128! A round later he then also beat Scotlands John Henderson, 6-4. In his board final Meulenkamp lost 3-6 to young talent Josh Rock. For the third time this year it was a first round game between Five time World Champion Raymond van Barneveld, and his practice partner Jeffrey de Zwaan. But for the first time, it was De Zwaan who won it, 6-3! In round 2 it was another 6-3 win over a multiple World Champion for JDZ this time against Adrian Lewis! In the last 32, De Zwaan also got 5-3 up, but his opponent Ryan Searle got back to 5-5. De Zwaan misses 2 matchdarts, and lost 5-6 to Searle who then went on to win the title…

Westervoort’s Jermaine Wattimena started with a 6-4 win against out of form Max Hopp. In round 2, The Machine Gun then edged out Brendan Dolan 6-5 with an average of 97! In round 3 Wattimena lost as well, 5-6 to Nathan Aspinall. Maik Kuivenhoven started by edging out German Ricardo Pietreczko 6-5, and then had an all Dutch second round clash with Dirk van Duijvenbode, who he also beat 6-5! Kuivenhoven only averaged 91 in it, with DVD averaging above 101 but it’s all about the winning double! However, in the last 32 Kuivenhoven lost 5-6 himself to Eddie Lovely.

Before his defeat, Van Duijvenbode did beat Spanish José Justicia 6-2 with an average of 101,3. UK Open Champion Danny Noppert played on stream in round 1 where he edged out Rusty-Jake Rodriguez 6-5, but Rusty-Jake’s brother got revenge as Noppert lost to Rowby-John in round 2, 2-6 with a 97 average as Rowby-John averaged over a ton. Last Dutch win of the day is for ‘Bionic’ Berry van Peer, who edged out another Austrian in Zoran Lerchbacher 6-5. Van Peer did lose in the last 64, 4-6 to Chisnall.

Friday’s winner Danny Jansen lost for the second day in a row in round 1, this time 4-6 to Henderson. Luc Peters was 5-3 up, but still lost 5-6 to Mervyn King in the last 128, while Niels Zonneveld was 3-5 down, and came back but also lost 5-6 in round 1 to Jamie Hughes. Other first round Dutch defeats were from: Damian Mol (3-6 against Darius Labanauskas), Jimmy Hendriks (5-6 against Searle), Martijn Kleermaker (1-6 against Ryan Meikle), Dutch American Jules van Dongen (2-6 against Rob Cross), Geert Nentjes (5-6 against Lukeman) and Kevin Doets (4-6 against Michael Unterbuchner).