England, Australia, Japan, Holland & Belgium

When you think of darts, you wouldn't instantly put all of those countries together. But the second night of the World Championships gave us representatives from all five countries. The opening match of the night saw England's Justin Pipe take on Australia's Sean Reed. After last night's dramatic action, no-one would have been surprised by Sean Reed's first set victory via a whitewash. But Pipe regained his darts and equalised with a 3-1 win. The third set went the distance and Pipe took the crucial fifth leg to take the 2-1 lead in the match. Pipe continued with the momentum and whitewashed Reed in the fourth set to progress.

The preliminary match of the night saw Japan's Haruki Muramatsu take on Sweden's Strongest Man in 2004, Dennis Nilsson. The crowd looked to favour the Japanese qualifier and it spurred Muramatsu to take a 2-0 lead with checkouts of 80 and 90. But Nilsson fought back and levelled the match at 2-2 to make it a best of three. Muramatsu managed to break the throw to retake the lead before winning the match 4-2 with a 102 checkout. His reward, a first round match against Phil Taylor.

The third match of the night saw Holland's Co Stompe take on Michael Smith. Smith came all out guns blazing and took the first leg of the match, but Stompe took the first set 3-1. Stompe repeated the feat in the second set to double his lead. There was another case of deja vu as Smith again won the first leg of the set before Stompe won the following three legs to win the match 3-0.

Fifth favourite Wes Newton started his campaign against Belgian competitor Kurt Van De Rijck. Newton took the first set 3-1 with Van De Rijck missing a bowl full of doubles. The Belgian made more of a fight of it in the second set, forcing a decider which was won by Newton. Van De Rijck again took the third set to a deciding leg before Newton again won the fifth leg to win the match 3-0 and go through to the second round.

Fifteen time World Champion Phil Taylor took on the preliminary qualifier Haruki Muramatsu. With a big bet on Taylor securing a whitewash, Muramatsu was able to win a leg in the first set against the veteran. Muramatsu won the opening leg of the second set before Taylor again won the set, 3-1.  Muramatsu continued to do what he could and he again won the first leg in third set but Taylor again won the set 3-1 to go through.