Michael van Gerwen was eliminated in the quarter-finals of the World Darts Championship (PDC), meaning all Dutch players are now eliminated from the tournament. The three-time world champion (2014, 2017 and 2019) surprisingly lost 3:5 to unseeded Scott Williams. It turned out that Van Gerwen was ill.
In the semi-finals, Williams will face third seed Luke Humphries, who defeated Dave Chisnall 5-1 in a top-flight match.
Watch Williams’ reaction to her win over Van Gerwen in two parts here:
Van Gerwen did not lose a set on his way to his eleventh World Cup quarter-final. For Williams, world number 52, this was her first appearance in the last eight of a major darts tournament.
In fact, Williams is so inexperienced on the big stage that Van Gerwen has only met him once. In October, Van Gerwen easily won the Players Championship 6-2 on aggregate.
But in this World Cup, the Englishman is throwing the darts of his life and enjoying it, clearly involving the crowd in his success.
serenade loudly
However, it was clear in attendance that Van Gerwen did not need to worry about a lack of support as the White Stripes sang along loudly.
Even Williams, who played with an emphasis on the crowd in the previous rounds, mumbled for a while, but it wasn’t good. But he seemed to have no nerves.
Williams’ first match
Van Gerwen missed the top spot in the first match (double 20), giving Williams the opportunity to take first place on the leaderboard. The Englishman missed the chance, but despite Van Gerwen missing three more times he still stole the first leg from the Dutchman.
After that, Van Gerwen was by far the better goalscorer, but the Dutchman failed to score in the doubles. Van Gerwen had seven chances to score the leg and missed them all. Williams took advantage of this chance and made three of six doubles to win the first set 3-0.
This was Van Gerwen’s first set defeat at the World Cup. In the second set, Brabander initially missed doubles but eventually scored on his eleventh attempt.
I just missed the nine darter
In the third game, Van Gerwen briefly moved towards a nine-darter shot. That didn’t work but he stepped up and took the two legs needed for the second set, both in 11 darts, without making a mistake in the doubles.
Winning the third set 3-1, Van Gerwen brought his opponent to the ropes for the first time.
It turned out that nothing could be further from the truth: Van Gerwen broke immediately in the fourth set. After the Englishman won the fifth set (3-0), Van Gerwen left the stage with a frown. Behind him, Williams heated up the crowd again.
The short break was good for Van Gerwen as he won the sixth set 3-0 to level the score at 3-3. But after that, “Wrecking Ball from Vlijmen” remained sloppy in doubles: he hit only eleven of 38 double attempts.
While Williams’ confidence increased, his three-dart average also decreased. The Englishman achieved an even higher average than Van Gerwen (96.32 to 93.41 per three darts throughout the entire match) and finished the match with his first dart.
In the semi-finals on Tuesday, Williams will face compatriot Luke Humphries, who beat Dave Chisnall 5-1. Humphries has already won three major tournaments in 2023 (World Grand Prix, Grand Slam and Players Championship Finals) and therefore starts the World Championship as one of the heavy favourites.
However, in the previous two rounds, the 28-year-old Briton could not get through a bottleneck. Humphries won 4-3 after a real thriller against German Ricardo Pietreczko and compatriot Joe Cullen.
It was much easier against Dave Chisnall, at least in terms of results. Humphries had to play his best game in a very high quality match. He did this with great effort: with an average of 103.5 per three arrows (even averaging over 110 in the fourth and fifth sets), Humphries reached a very high level.
If Humphries wins the World Cup final on Wednesday, he will become the new world number one. If that doesn’t work, it’s Van Gerwen’s, despite the World Cup hype.
Four Englishmen in the semi-finals
The other semi-final will be played between 16-year-old prodigy Luke Littler and his compatriot Rob Cross. In darts, which has become increasingly international, four Englishmen are in the semi-finals for the first time since 2006.
In addition to Williams and 16-year-old prodigy Luke Littler, the semi-final also features two unseeded players. Two unseeded players have already reached the semi-finals of the World Cup. Mark Webster and Simon Whitlock did it in 2010.
Source: NOS

I’m George Gonzalez, a professional journalist and author at The Nation View. With more than 5 years of experience in the field, I specialize in covering sports news for various print media outlets. My passion for writing has enabled me to craft stories that capture the attention of readers all over the world.