Charlie Wood
Stephen Bunting edged past Gerwyn Price in a thrilling 6-5 final in Berlin to claim victory in Week 9 of the Premier League.
Coming into the night winless, Bunting defeated Nathan Aspinall and Luke Humphries to set up a final with the Welshman.
A neat 87 checkout on the bullseye calmed any Bunting nerves, as crowd antics contributed to Price’s costly mistakes on doubles.
After six legs of a final that lacked consistent quality, neither player had held throw, but the tie remained finely poised.
Two missed darts from Bunting in leg nine handed Price the chance to move one leg away from a third nightly triumph.
Yet, amongst heavy crowd whistling, ‘The Iceman’ missed two match darts, which afforded ‘The Bullet’ a chance at 25 to force a decider.
In a tense final leg, Price had the early ascendancy, but an excellent 107 checkout propelled Bunting from Premier League basement to Berlin champion.
Following the game, Bunting said: “I’ve put a lot of work in behind the scenes. I’ve tried every week 110% without fail…and tonight I’ve won an event and I’m so happy.”
“When you win that first game after such a long time on the big stage it takes a lot of pressure off.”
After hitting a 9-darter on the practice boards, Bunting won his quarter-final 6-2 against Nathan Aspinall.
He ended his losing streak with the highest average of the night (103) in a relatively mediocre standard across the board.
After stealing the third leg from under Aspinall’s nose, ‘The Bullet’ shot into a commanding lead.
He held his nerve on D8 to win his first Premier League game for over 10 years.
The hurdle of a quarter-final victory was finally surpassed, with the 39-year-old visibly emotional.
Bunting’s level dropped in the semi-final against Humphries, but he still emerged as a 6-2 victor.
A break of throw in the, as ‘The Bullet’ put daylight between himself and the former World Champion.
The low-quality tussle was concluded with a Bunting D20, while Humphries, who averaged only 88, will hope to erase the memories of this encounter quickly.
On the other side of the draw, Gerwyn Price brushed past Dobey 6-2.
Price, who had received a walk-over in the quarter-finals due to Michael van Gerwen’s shoulder injury, raced into an early 2-0 lead.
The Welshman shrugged off a potential Dobey comeback, as Price continued to maximise the opportunities provided by Dobey’s inconsistency.
With his last dart in hand, Price hit the match-winning D20 to seal a place in his third nightly final of the season.
In the night’s shock, Luke Littler was bettered by Dobey 6-2.
In a week where the Professional Darts Corporation has announced an increase in total prize money – from £7 million to £25 million, largely attributed to Littler’s impact – ‘The Nuke’ struggled to find the form that had placed him at the helm of the Premier League rankings.
Dobey capitalised on Littler’s inefficiencies on the outer ring to land only his fourth victory of the season.
A missed dart from Littler on his usually strong D10 afforded ‘Hollywood’ the chance for the first break of the tie.
An exceptional leg from the World Champion, to reduce the Dobey advantage to 5-2, positioned the 18-year-old to replicate earlier season comeback heroics.
Yet, an uncharacteristic visit, which left Littler stranded on 165, gifted Dobey the breathing room to finish off the match on D20.
Elsewhere, Humphries came from 3-1 down to beat Rob Cross 6-3.
Cross had made a strong start with a 110 checkout on his beloved D18 to break the Humphries throw and take early control.
However, Humphries rallied with a flurry of legs to level the tie at 3-3, in the strongest spell of darts of the night.
Despite Cross’ impressive scoring power, Humphries showed exceptional finishing to turn the tide, as he won five consecutive legs.
Both players had respectable efforts at ton-plus checkouts in leg nine, before ‘Cool Hand’ clinched victory on D10.
Charlie Wood
Featured image courtesy of Florian Wehde via Unsplash. Image use license found here (Unsplash). No changes were made to this image.
In article image 1 courtesy of @officialpdc via Instagram. No changes were made to this image.
In article image 2 courtesy of @officialpdc via Instagram. No changes were made to this image.
In article image 3 courtesy of @officialpdc via Instagram. No changes were made to this image.
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