Winmau MvG Diamond Edition Dartboard

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A shy waitress explains that linguine is pasta and Van Gerwen’s brooding expression suddenly lights up. “OK,” he says. “Spaghetti bolognaise. I’ll have that. Soup and spaghetti bolognaise.” Another Dutch player, Raymond Van Barneveld, had tested positive after beginning to feel unwell following his 3-1 defeat by Rob Cross on Thursday night.

The continued rise of darts has been escalated by Van Gerwen’s colourful emergence – and his compelling rivalry with Taylor. “Darts gets bigger every year,” he says. “It’s really popular in Holland and, after football, it’s our most-watched sport. It’s the same in Britain and it’s amazing Sky are having their own darts channel for the world championships. That shows how popular darts has become. So I get stopped all the time now. Everyone notices me, the green shirt and my bald head. Daphne’s a hairdresser and of course she can’t do anything with me. But that doesn’t matter because it’s become like my brand.” Anderson celebrated his second ranking title of the year in Friday’s Players Championship 24, having produced a series of breath-taking displays throughout last week’s ProTour treble-header. I am happy with my game at the moment, but this is a really tough event to win, and with the short format in the early rounds, you can’t afford to make any mistakes. That’s all for our coverage of a memorable final. It was the night when one of the nice guys finally completed his Homeric journey to greatness, and won the greatest leg in darts history to boot. Michael Smith is now world champion and world No1, and who knows what this victory will empower him to achieve.

I think it’s going to be wide open this year. You can’t really say an outsider [will win it], but I don’t think it will be one of the favourites. Maybe it could be an old 52-year-old, you never know!” It’s still been a great tournament for Van Gerwen, who played his best darts in maybe five years, but in the end he met somebody who could live with his scoring and even surpass it. Smith wasn’t always at his best in this tournament – he was 3-1 down to Martin Schindler in the last 32 – but he peaked when it mattered. Aspinall keeps the match alive with a finish from 57 to complete an impressive 15-darter. Can he win two more to finally get a set on the board? We get to sit here together now, but we had imagined this very differently. Again, this is really the biggest nightmare. I test myself here every day. I don’t know where I got it. Yet we are the loser.” He says: “I didn’t want to lose that one. I had a big lead but then you start looking at the trophy and that’s the worst thing … but I pulled it out at the right time. That was my sweetest moment in life. Nothing beats becoming world champion unless, maybe, you do it a second or third time. I would love to catch Phil but it’s not going to happen. 16 world titles is amazing. I’m trying to win 10 but there are so many good players. When Phil was on top he was so above everyone else. Now, it’s much more competitive.”

Following a challenging 18 months, the two-time World Champion has returned to his brilliant best in 2023, and he believes enjoyment has been the key to his revival. Gary Anderson (Taylor Lanning/PDC) I am defending money from winning the World Grand Prix two years ago, so let’s see how it goes,” said Clayton, whose father passed away just days after his run to July’s World Matchplay decider. There was an electric atmosphere in the Empress Ballroom for this highly anticipated match-up and it was the 2021 world champion Price who raced off to lead 4-0. Three-time Grand Slam champion Gerwyn Price swept aside Nathan Rafferty 5-1 in his Group D opener, in a contest which saw the pair trade spectacular 164 and 167 combination finishes. On New Year’s Day 2014, in the final against Peter Wright, the Scot who favours a colourful Mohican and paints a snake on the side of his shaven head, Van Gerwen “was a huge favourite”.

International Open results

Michael wasn’t at his best today. He missed a couple of doubles and those crucial doubles have got to go in if you want to win tournaments. In the other Group H tie, Damon Heta defeated Ricardo Pietreczko in similar fashion, producing a 150 skin-saver in the penultimate leg, before surviving a match dart from the German newcomer in a dramatic decider. Grand Slam of Darts results This really is a frightening standard from van Gerwen as scores of 120, 97, 140, 128 leave him 16, which he takes out at the first attempt for a 13 darter. He's averaging just a shade under 100 right now.

Her response is not quite the same as when a roaring crowd at Alexandra Palace reacts exultantly to the many faces of Mighty Mike during the PDC world championship – which starts on Thursday with Van Gerwen playing Joe Cullen. The Asp looks as though he's carved out a pressure-free dart at a double to break MVG until the Dutchman throws a 180 to leave himself 30 - but nevertheless he pins double 16 with his first attempt for a classy and nerveless 13 darter. Van Gerwen replied with another leg but the deficit was too much to recover as Price finally finished things off to claim his eighth Euro Tour title. Taylor remains his fiercest rival. “Definitely,” Van Gerwen says. “He’s always my main rival. But we both have a long way to go before this next final. They say the most difficult one to win is the first world title and I really hope it is because I’d like to become a three-time world champion in the next four or five years. But the aim now is to win the first round on Thursday, go to the horse racing at Ascot on Friday and home to Holland on Saturday.”

I just turn up and play darts now, and I giggle when I win," quipped Anderson, a runner-up to Van Gerwen in the 2016 edition. The final begins at around 1945 BST so between now and then we'll run through the routes to the final, tournament statistics, head-to-head records and some predictions. Dirk van Duijvenbode and Brendan Dolan open the tournament in a battle of the former finalists, as two-time runner-up Raymond van Barneveld makes his double-start return against Germany’s Martin Schindler. Following the conclusion of the first round, the last 16 will take place across Wednesday October 4 and Thursday October 5, before the quarter-finals are staged on Friday October 6.

It is hard enough to win a ProTour, never mind a TV tournament, but I believe it is going to come one day, and hopefully it comes this week. He's been phenomenal all week but I never gave in. It's another final and I'm very happy." MICHAEL VAN GERWEN ROLL OF HONOUR Van Gerwen was, then, still working as a part-time tiler in Holland. One of the internet’s typically overblown stories claims he tiled Dennis Berkgamp’s bathroom. “That’s not true,” Van Gerwen says. “I did the tiling at a house across the road from Bergkamp. But, sure, it was a very posh area. I was 18 and working two days a week. It’s different today. I own two houses and, well, I’m married to Daphne. We’ve been together seven years. She was only 14 when we met, and I was nearly 18. They had a music evening and she was with her parents. I asked if I could watch a movie with her. Life has changed since then because darts has got really big.” I have to give credit to Beau - she was the player in pot four that nobody wanted," said Aspinall, who was runner-up to Smith last year.World Matchplay champion Aspinall meets a resurgent Stephen Bunting for a place in round two, while eighth seed Rob Cross has been pitted against UK Open champion Andrew Gilding. That was a great win,” Van Gerwen says, “especially as all the pressure was on me as the new world champion. Phil was a bit off that day but I played really well. In the early days against Phil, I lost eight in a row. But the first time I played Phil on TV I beat him in Holland 3-0. In television matches he’s 9-7 up. That shows we’re close in the big matches. We have a great rivalry and we like to play each other.” The injury has gone, but of course I'm using painkillers and physio because you need to keep it going. You have to try to do everything to make the Play-Offs." It should be a fantastic game against Josh. He is a phenomenal player,” claimed Van Gerwen, a winner of the World Grand Prix in 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2022. Aspinall's third 180 - which came after dropping his third dart - puts him in pole position to hold his throw and although MVG puts on pressure with his second, the Asp pinds double eight with his last dart in hand after his opponent had spurned an effort at tops.