Queensland Darts Masters Townsville 2022 Night 2 Preview Final MvG held a 16 win and 1 draw record in their first 17 matches until Price won 16-12 at the Grand Clam of Darts. in 2019 Van Gerwen then went on to win three more matches before Price upset MvG in the 2020 Premier League. Since then the two have met ten times and the head to head is 5-5. MvG leads 24-7 head to head and is the second most successful player in the history of the competition downunder only behind Phil Taylor with 4 competition wins, but can Price do it on debut as Taylor did?
Semi Final 1 Cullen has a long way to catch up to van Gerwen with a 19 -9 head to head record. Van Gerwen has won their last 3 meetings including their last two premier league matches.
Semi Final 2 Gerwyn Price and Gordon Mathers have never faced each other. For Price this is his first event downunder whilst PDC card holder Mathers is doing his home state of Queensland proud only a day after Queensland won the men and women team events at Moama.
Quarter Final 1 Dimitri van Den Bergh v Joe Cullen On TV head to head Cullen holds the record here at 4-2 but van Den Bergh has won the last two. Remarkably they have not faced each other on TV for over two years since the 2020 World Matchplay, won by Van den Bergh 6-5. These two played great darts in night one and this should be an entertaining affair.
Quarter Final 2 Michael van Gerwen v Haupai Puha Puha and MvG have never faced off, although Puha has played former world champions in Gary Anderson, Raymond van Barneveld and Rob Cross before in the World Series events. MvG has the second best record of any player in the World Series downunder and is always hard to beat on night two but with the rich vein of form Puha is in, and the confidence he will get out of seeing Bailey Marsh do so well against the dutchman on night one, he will believe that anything is possible.
Quarter Final 3 Michael Smith v Gordon Mathers They have never played against each other on TV but around four months ago Michael Smith beat Gordon Mathers in the players championship quarter final stage 6-3. Mathers was nervous towards the back end of his match last night but now having secured a win on TV he can go into this match with more belief. Smith played very well last night and will want to add to his tally of one final in world series downunder events, Mathers being the next obstacle in that quest.
Quarter Final 4 Gerwyn Price v Simon Whitlock Price leads this head to head in TV tournaments 11-7. Whitlock lost the last two World Cup finals match up with Price and in a sense this was a match that we missed out on in the 2022 World Cup as it was not needed after Heta won. There was some controversy between the two in the World Championships in December 2019 when Price was quoted discussing the slow pace at which Whitlock played the game. Whitlock is enjoying his darts right now and his family is seeing him play live, some for the first time in a very long time. Price survived a tight game last night and had to be at his best to beat Australia’s number one player, will he take out Australia’s former number one in Whitlock?
Queensland Darts Masters Townsville 2022 Night 1 Preview Match 1 Dimitri Van den Bergh v Koha Kokiri
This is Dimitri’s debut in the WSD downunder, but not his first match in Queensland, or even Townsville, as he took part in the 2018 prodart series. Kokiri has played in four events, averaging two legs for in those matches. With Van den Bergh seeded number one, having won both WSD events he has been a part of this year, and Kokirir showing his class at the Warilla Bowls and Recreation Club by winning two knowck out events on the one day, it will be a great opening fixture.
Match 2 Joe Cullen v Dave Marland
Joe Cullen has a pretty good record against Australians. He defeated the late great Kyle Anderson in their four fixtures, and defeated Corey Cadby in the World Championships. The recent world matchplay saw him defeat Damon Heta. In players championship 3 this year he defeated GG Mathers along the way before defeating Heta in the final. Only Simon Whitlock (7-3) seems to stand strong for Aussies in the records against the rockstar. Dave Marland has secured his position as the number 1 in NSW in recent times and goes in with the experience of playing Daryl Gurney in the first Melbourne Darts Masters. He will want more that that experience though. It should be a good match.
Match 3 Jonny Clayton v Haupai Puha
Jonny Clayton’s record is impeccable and his rise enormous but he has just tapered off that excellence in recent times, still a remarkable player but not quite at the heights of the previous year. It is his debut in Australia and he takes on Kiwi Puha who recently lost in the final of the Pacific Masters to Neil Duff and made the Australian Open final, losing to Ray Smith, so he is in good form. He has had European experience through the pandemic too and will be out to prove how good he is on a stage that has not been his friend previously, having lost his five matches. That does not quite tell the whole story though as he picked up 12 legs and averaged a smidge under 90 across those games. He is up for the Clayton challenge.
Match 4 Fallon Sherrock v Gordon Mathers
Mathers has not had a great record in the WSD, having lost his previous two matches. He is returning to Queensland so is sure to get the vocal support of the crowd. Sherrock is a star and has won matches on this years WSD tour. With the likes of Greaves and Ashton in the country at present Sherrock will be out to have her name in the lights once more, especially against a PDC tour card holder. In her debut she is also sure to get strong support from the crowd. It should be a tight match.
Match 5 James Wade v Simon Whitlock
Simon Whitlock historically held a 22-18 lead over James Wade but in the last five years Wade has turned that around, leading 4-2. However since defeating Whitlock in the UK Open in March Whitlock secured a famous semi final win 4-0 in the World Cup semi finals. Whitlock has enjoyed his darts recently and will want to improve upon a semi final appearance in the WSD downunder. A couple of wins and he will even his record up in the competition downunder, having won 15 and lost 17 previously. Wade has made one final downunder and holds a winning record at 20 wins and 14 losses but his aim will be to win a trophy, and have fun doing so along the way. This will be very tight as the crowd tries to get the Aussie home in this first England v Australia battle of the night.
Match 6 Michael van Gerwen v Bailey Marsh
If Bailey Marsh would want to be compared to anyone it is MvG. Marsh is young, classy on the board, super confident off it, and confident against anyone. MvG has enjoyed success in the WSD downunder but not to the level he would expect of himself and thus will believe he can get past this young Aussie up start, but if Marsh can keep his head and snatch an early lead he will have the confidence in his own game that he can do the great dutchman. Van Gerwen is not the young star he was once as he mowed down the top professional players, he is now the one the youngsters are targeting. It should be an enjoyable fixture, van Gerwen’s record 36 for 11 against, with four trophies from the 18 contested downunder.
Match 7 Gerwyn Price v Damon Heta
It was bound to happen with all four World Cup finalists in the draw. Price v Heta made the headlines in the World Cup as Heta won 4-0 in the final. Previous to that the story is all Price with the Welsh star winning six on the trot. Heta is, of course, the defending Queensland champion, albeit as the Brisbane Darts Masters winner. He will want to show the locals the progress he has made over at the PDC and will enjoy much support of the crowd. Hopefully the crowd will acknowledge Price positively as well for as a former World Champion we are lucky to have him here this year. After all without Anderson, Cross, Taylor and van Barneveld in the field Price and van Gerwen are the only former PDC senior World Champions participating downunder this year.
Match 8 Michael Smith v Joe Comito
Michael Smith made the semi finals of the World Championships this year, he also made the semi finals of the World Cup. He Is also a former finalist in the World Series of Darts downunder. He holds a 6-6 record in events down here. He averages 94 in the tournaments. However he wont know the tenacity of the man about to face him. Comito’s perseverance in the qualifiers to come back and make final after final having lost the previous one, was incredible and the pressure to do it at the very last attempt was enormous. He will be there with nothing to lose and all to gain, a very dangerous opponent to the man form St Helens. Smith’s WSD downunder final came in 2018 in Melbourne, he will only have a chance at doing one better by getting past the tenacious player he faces in round one.
Queensland Darts Masters Early Preview
The field for the Queensland Darts Masters leg of the PDC World Series of Darts 2022 series at the Townsville Entertainment and Convention Centre in Townsville on August 12th and 13th has now been finalised. The field is James Wade, Gerwyn Price, Johnny Clayton, Dmitri van den Bergh (replacing Peter Wright), Joe Cullen, Michael van Gerwen, Michael Smith, Fallon Sherrock, Damon Heta, GG Mathers, Simon Whitlock, Joe Comito, Dave Marland, Bailey Marsh, Koha Kokiri and Haupai Puha. In 2018 and 2019 Brisbane held two WSD events in the state, referred to as the Brisbane Darts Masters. Now it is on the road in Queensland it is the Queensland Darst Masters. The Brisbane leg is most famous for the first triumph on the non PDC side when Damon Heta won it in 2019 (when the late, great Kyle Anderson won in Auckland he was playing on the PDC side of the draw, his opponent on the night, Corey Cadby, had been on the other side of the draw.) Heta returns to the state where he had WSD success with his record reading 2 events 4 wins, 1 loss, 35 legs for, 30 against. Of those 4 wins only James Wade and Simon Whitlock are in this field. Whitlock himself has played in both Brisbane events, losing in the first round in 2018 but making the semi finals in 2019 (where he lost to Heta.) He has never played a PDC card holder in the Queensland events in his four matches. His record is 4 matches with 2 wins and 2 losses, 24 legs for and 15 legs against. The Queenslander in the field, Mathers, has only played once in his home state, with a loss in the opening round in 2019. Koha Kokiri is the other person on the qualifiers side that has played in a WSD event in Queensland, losing first round in 2019 to Daryl Gurney. Thus Mathers and Kokiri will be facing new opponents in terms of Queensland based events. The other four qualifiers (Marland, Puha, Marsh and Comito) have not played in Queensland based World Series events previously. On the PDC side of the draw Sherrock, Cullen, Price, and Clayton all make their debuts in Queensland events as they are on their first trip with the World Series to Australia and New Zealand. With Peter Wright unable to come due to an injury Dmitri van den Bergh makes a return to Queensland, the last time he was here was for the Prodarts series in 2018. He has made a huge impact on the World Series stage in 2022 but technically it will be his debut in the World Series events down under. It means the PDC has six of the eight Premier League 2022 line up, the highest representation of that competition in one event downunder ever. That leaves MvG, James Wade and Michael Smith to return in this series to Qld. Smith has lost his only match on the WSD stage in the state to another Smith, Queensland’s own Raymond in 2018. Van Gerwen has a six match 4 win two loss record in the state, losing the final in 2018 and being eliminated in the quarter final stage in 2019. Wade, like Smith, has only one match in the Queensland events, losing to Damon Heta in the first round in 2019. Nine of the 16 players in the field have played at the World Series before in Australia or New Zealand, and if you add global World Series events it will only be Bailey Marsh and Joe Comito making their debut on the big stage at this event. The field’s record in Australia and New Zealand events are:
Van Gerwen 47 matches 36 wins 11 losses 8 finals 4 times champion Wade 34 matches 20 wins 14 losses 1 final Smith 12 matches 6 wins 6 losses 1 final Whitlock 32 matches 15 wins 17 losses Heta 12 matches 6 wins 6 losses 1 final 1 time champion Mathers 2 matches 2 losses Marland 1 match 1 loss Kokiri 4 match 4 losses Puha 5 match 5 losses
In terms of head to head in the WSD across Australia and New Zealand Heta has played Wade, Van Gerwen and Whitlock before downunder in the World Series of Darts. Kokiri has faced Wade before, Mathers has faced off against Van Gerwen and Whitlock has Wade, Heta, and Van Gerwen as possible repeat opponents. The last time a World Series event was played in Qld the line up was: Raymond van Barneveld, Daryl Gurney, James Wade, Simon Whitlock, Rob Cross, Michael van Gerwen, Gary Anderson, Peter Wright, Haupai Puha, Koha Kokiri, Damon Heta, Brendon McCausland, James Bailey, Ben Robb, Corey Cadby and Kyle Anderson.