Michael van Gerwen has reached the quarterfinals of the World Grand Prix. The Dutchman won 3-2 against Stephen Bunting in the eighth final. De Vlijmenaar was especially changeable on his doubles.
Finishes of 141 and 150 were thrown as if it were nothing. But just before that, he missed too many arrows on his doubles. It featured the shape of Van Gerwen. The darts player from Brabant is not yet at his top level, but shows that he has not forgotten it yet.
Disadvantage
Especially in the first set, Van Gerwen was struggling on his finishing doubles. Starting with a double, as the rules are at the World Grand Prix, was no problem. This led to the Vlijmenaar having to let the first set go to Bunting.
But after that it got better. Where he only threw 20% of his doubles in the first set, this percentage went to 70% in the second set.
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But the second set was an incident. After that, the decline was again great at Van Gerwen. Again the doubles failed. Nevertheless, he took a 2-1 lead and in the fourth set he had the perfect opportunity to close the game. But three chances for double fours were missed.
Decisive set
Bunting took advantage of the opportunity and broke Van Gerwen. Despite the fact that the Brabander immediately broke back, the set went to the Englishman. He made it 2-2 and so a deciding set had to be played.
Van Gerwen had to break the number 20 of the world ranking once. He did that in the first leg. De Brabander didn’t run into problems after that and took fifth and therefore the game.
Chris Dobey awaits in the quarterfinals on Friday evening. An easy opponent on paper, but then Van Gerwen should not make it as difficult as Wednesday evening.