‘Barney’ crawls through the eye of the needle and prepares for a wonderful clash with Michael van Gerwen at Dutch Darts Masters | Sport

Van Barneveld quickly followed suit in a packed Maaspoort Den Bosch. Cross took a 0-2 lead, but the Dutch crowd favorite caught up again. Barney and Voltage made it an exciting match, which went to a deciding leg at 5-5. The Englishman left in that decider two arrows for the match were not used, after which Van Barneveld only needed one to finish. A clash with Michael van Gerwen may now await in the semi-finals. He will compete against his best friend Vincent van der Voort later this Friday.

This was the exciting final leg of ‘Barney’:

Takes place in the semi-finals Barney against Michael van Gerwen on Saturday. The Brabant audience saw how their fellow provincial was a size too big for best friend Vincent van der Voort from the first leg. Mighty Mike immediately took a 3-0 lead and was no longer caught The Dutch Destroyer: 6-1. With two 180 scores, a finishing percentage of 50% and an overall average of 94.06, Van Gerwen qualified for the last eight.

Dirk van Duijvenbode could not make much of an impression for the Dutch public. The Dutchman was no match for seventeen-year-old darts sensation Luke Littler. The young Englishman joined the quarter-finalists with a 6-2 win. There he will face the man who defeated him in the World Cup final at the beginning of this month. Luke Humphries blasted Jermaine Wattimena home at breakneck speed 6-0, giving us part 2 of The Nuke vs. Cool Hand Luke.

Noppert also reached the quarter-finals. Noppert and Aspinall broke each other in the first two legs, but then it was the Dutchman who won four legs in a row. Aspinall took another leg, but it was Noppert who got three match darts from 85. TheFreezewhich had an average of 95.68, played with control and convincingly qualified for the quarter-finals. “This audience brings out something extra in you,” he said afterwards.

Kevin Doets also reached the quarter-finals in Den Bosch. The Dutchman, making his World Series debut, won against world number 8 Peter Wright. That was somewhat surprising, although the Scot has been struggling with his form for some time. The match in the first round ended 6-2 for Doets, who threw six 180s and recorded an average of 98.31.

Another former world champion was killed in Den Bosch on Friday: Michael Smith. Gian van Veen sent Bully Boy back to England by winning 6-3. Smith in particular did not reach his level. He scored an average of 88.22 points per turn and with a throw percentage of 30% he did not do enough to hurt the Dutchman. This is how the world number 43 beat the number 3.

This is how Van Veen finished it:

Sixteen darts players are participating in the Dutch Darts Masters in Maaspoort Den Bosch, eight of whom are Dutch. The winner of the final, which will be played on Saturday evening, will walk away with 24,000 euros. The total prize pool is approximately 70,000 euros. Michael van Gerwen is the record winner of the Dutch Darts Masters with five final victories, which was held in Amsterdam during the last edition. At the time, Dimitri Van den Bergh won.

• Nathan Aspinall – Danny Noppert 2-6
• Peter Wright – Kevin Doets 2-6
• Gerwyn Price – Dimitri Van den Bergh 6-3
• Michael Smith – Gian van Veen 3-6
• Rob Cross – Raymond van Barneveld 5-6
• Luke Littler – Dirk van Duijvenbode 6-2
• Luke Humphries – Jermaine Wattimena 6-0
• Michael van Gerwen – Vincent van der Voort 6-1

• Luke Littler – Luke Humphries
• Gerwyn Price – Kevin Doets
• Michael van Gerwen – Raymond van Barneveld
• Gian van Veen – Danny Noppert