Florian Hempel crowned a brilliant comeback at the Darts World Cup in London by reaching the third round.
In his Cologne carnival outfit, the former handball goalkeeper won 3-2 on Friday evening against the favorite Belgian Dimitri van den Bergh, number 15 in the world rankings.
“I’m the man for comebacks,” said Hempel during the winner’s interview.
Since Martin Schindler also defeated the Dutchman Jermaine Wattimena 3-1, four Germans are in the third round of a World Cup for the first time.
After a stressful return journey by ferry, Hempel initially couldn’t find his game at Alexandra Palace; he had problems scoring consistently high points.
He lost a 2-0 lead twice in the legs, then won the third set – and from then on played himself into a frenzy against the “Dreammaker”.
He converted the second match dart to victory. This means that the Cologne native has secured his PDC tour card for the coming year.
In the evening, Martin Schindler successfully completed his match against Jermaine Wattimena (Netherlands) (3:1) and also moved into round 3.
The next German in action is Ricardo Pietreczko: The World Cup debutant will face Englishman Callan Rydz in his second round match on Saturday. Dragutin Horvat failed in the first round.