Saturday, 4 February 2012

2012 Darts WC: Quarter Finals

Australia faced Belgium in the first quarter final of the night. Simon Whitlock took on Kurt Van de Rijck in the first singles battle. It wasn't really much of a contest at the Premier League entrant showed his superiority, winning it 4-0. The other singles match was a rematch from the World Championships between Paul Nicholson and Kim Huybrechts. Huybrechts got the better of Nicholson in that match, although The Asset complained about the crowd's reaction to Kim's girlfriend, Dana, getting shown on screen. This time Dana was nowhere to be seen but Nicholson still found himself 3-2 down after being level at 1-1. Again Huybrechts got the better of Nicholson with a 4-3 victory, setting up a winner-takes-all doubles match. The Aussies took a 2-0 lead before it was cut down to 3-2 but Australia still won the match 4-2 to progress into the semi-finals.

The was big drama in the second match as Wales took on South Africa. Wales were the definite favourites and Mark Webster set their stall out with a 4-0 victory over Shawn Hogan. But the second match between Richie Burnett and Devon Petersen was much closer. Petersen took the first leg and never went behind despite having to win the deciding leg to win the game. The doubles match also went all the way and Wales went from 2-0 ahead to 2-2. Petersen then found a 105 check-out to give South Africa the lead before it Wales' turn to level the match. Petersen then thought he won the game when he hit seven double 16 before realising he made a huge mistake, he needed 49 not 39 and therefore still had ten. With Petersen almost inconsolable, Richie Burnett had no choice but to take the gift of double eight to win the match and scrape through to the semis.

England have scraped through at every stage so far and this was no exception. They faced USA and Phil Taylor needed to recover from his defeat yesterday against Gary Mawson. Taylor led throughout but Mawson still managed to force a decider at 3-3. Then history was made as Mawson actually took the seventh leg to ensure Taylor's second defeat in just two days. It was just as close as Adrian Lewis took on Darin Young. It went exactly the same way, except this time it was Darin Young that led throughout until Lewis took the final leg to steal the victory. England took the first leg before finding themselves 2-1 behind. Taylor was still rather off but Lewis helped him through as England again regained the lead and won the match 4-2 to again squeeze through.

The final quarter final saw Holland battle it out against Northern Ireland. Vincent Van der Voort opened the match up against Brendan Dolan. Dolan took a 3-1 lead with Van der Voort wasteful until the Dutchman regained some form and managed to set up a deciding leg. A sloppy final leg saw both players miss doubles before Van der Voort hit double three to take the match 4-3. Raymond Van Barneveld took on Michael Mansell in the other singles match. Barney found himself 1-0 then 2-1 behind before the Dutchman fired back to lead 3-2 and took the sixth leg to give Holland a 2-0 lead. The doubles match kicked off a with a sloppy opening leg in which both teams missed darts at the double. Holland finally took it and then went 2-0 up. Belgium did fight back to 3-2 but couldn't prevent Holland from taking the doubles and winning the match 3-1.

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