Raymond van Barneveld wins Players Championship 3!

Wim Blokpoel - Today was an astonishing day as five-time champion of the world Raymond van Barneveld, who made his comeback and won his tourcard back only 2 weeks ago, won his first ranking tournament since 2013 and first individual PDC title since 2014. RVB has written a little more history as his brilliant story goes on. The legend started today with a 6-3 win over Polish Krzysztof Kciuk. In round 2 RVB had a tough draw, facing former World Champion Rob Cross. He came 4-5 down and even survived a matchdart but with a 100 average RVB got over the line 6-5. Into the last 32 where he faced Mervyn King, and it was a 98 average and another 6-5 win from the legend from The Hague. RVB’s best performance came in the last 16 where he got revenge over Lithuanian Darius Labanauskas who beat him at the 2019 Worlds. RVB averaged an unreal 105.7 and won 6-1. Scottish talent Alan Soutar was the opponent in the quarter-finals but RVB won comfortably again, 6-2. The semi-finals saw him average 100.5 in a 7-3 win over Ian Diamond White. Into his first PDC Final since the summer of 2019, RVB faced Thursday’s winner Joe Cullen. Cullen started brilliant, but RVB fought back. After much missed opportunities from both it became 6-6. RVB then won the next leg to go one away from the win. In leg 14 both players missed loads of darts at double, but RVB did hit the final one, won 8-6 and is the winner of the tournament! He is now even looking good to make majors like the World Grand Prix, and obviously the Players Championship Finals and World Championship.

But there was even more Dutch success! It came from the player who beat RVB yesterday, The Freeze Danny Noppert! Noppert started with 2 very easy wins, 6-2 against JDC Chairman Steve Brown and even 6-0 against Austrian Harald Leitinger. In the last 32 then Danny had his best match of the day as he averaged 99.4 to beat yesterday’s winner Callan Rydz 6-5. The last 16 went a lot easier again for Noppert with a 6-0 demolishment over Eddie Lovely. The quarter-finals wasn’t even the end, as The Freeze from Friesland won 6-4 against yesterday’s runner-up Jonny Clayton who averaged 103 in that game. The semi-finals were the end for Noppert with a 3-7 defeat to Cullen but a very good day for Noppert as well! 

A bit more success came from 3 more Dutchmen in the last 32. For the third day in a row Dirk ‘Aubergenius’ van Duijvenbode won at least 3 games. DVD started with a 104.9 average to beat Brett Claydon 6-4 in an amazing match. He then continued his good form while averaging 102.2 to beat Gary Anderson 6-2 and get revenge over the two-time world champion who beat him in the last 8 of this year’s World Championship. After missed matchdart, the last 32 was the end for Van Duijvenbode in a 5-6 defeat to Polish Krzysztof Ratajski but more money earned from him today. Someone who improved a lot today, was Ron Meulenkamp who won his first games of this week. Ron the Bomb started with a 6-2 win over former World’s finalist Andy Hamilton, before he won in an astonishing match 6-5 to Damon Heta while averaging 103.1. Even more ridiculous: Heta himself averaged 109 and lost! Unfortunately the third round didn’t go as well for Meulenkamp as he lost 1-6 to Glen Durrant, but still 2 wins! Final Dutchman in the last 32 was surprisingly enough Berry van Peer! Van Peer who won back his tourcard this year, started with a comfortable 6-1 victory against Michael Unterbuchner and in round 2 Van Peer averaged 92.2 and won 6-3 against Ryan Joyce. The last 32 was also the end for Berry van Peer as he narrowly lost 5-6 to former World Champion Peter Wright. A very good day for him as well though.

2 more Dutch wins to mention from today. A very great win came from Derk Telnekes, as the talent from Deventer beat Australia’s number one Simon Whitlock 6-2 in round 1, before losing out 2-6 himself to German Gabriel Clemens. Final win came from Jermaine Wattimena. The machine gun won 6-2 against Ryan Meikle with a 98 average, before he brutally lost to Irish talent Keane Barry 3-6 despite averaging 104.5. Unfortunately, 10 Dutchmen lost out in round 1 already. Biggest surprise was world number two Michael van Gerwen who averaged 99.3 but still lost 3-6 to Labanauskas. Another unlucky loss came from former Lakeside champion Jelle Klaasen, who averaged 100.7 but still lost 3-6 to Steve Lennon. Other loses in round 1 were for: Geert Nentjes (5-6 to Peter Jacques), Lorenzo Pronk (3-6 to Kai Fan Leung), Maik Kuivenhoven (2-6 to Keegan Brown), Luc Peters (2-6 to John Brown), Martijn Kleermaker (3-6 to Ciaran Teehan), Niels Zonneveld (5-6 to Mervyn King), Jeffrey De Zwaan (0-6 to Keane Barry) and Vincent van der Voort (4-6 to Martin Thomas)