The final third round matches saw three top class games and it is now known that seven of the top eight ranked players have made the quarter final line-up. Joint tournament favourite, Michael Van Gerwen, managed to push Colin Lloyd aside. But the performance of the night once again went to Raymond Van Barneveld who took full advantage of Gary Anderson's missed doubles to blow him away. The defending Champion, Adrian Lewis, also performed better to see off his toughest test so far, Kevin Painter.
It wasn't Barney's best average of the tournament but his performance was still rather dominant, and the difference between him and Anderson was ultimately the doubles. The Scot missed two darts to take a 2-1 lead and break the throw in the opening set. This allowed Barney to take it and go onto win the set 3-2, with all legs going with throw.
The first break came in the third leg of the second set. Anderson again missed three darts to hold, but ultimately relinquished his darts as Barney took the set 3-1. The Dutchman then broke in the second leg of the third set after Anderson again missed three darts to hold. But Barney then missed two set winning darts for Anderson to break back and then go onto force a deciding set. Barney again held the throw to go 3-0 in front. At that stage, Anderson looked to lose all ambition and missed a further two darts in the opening leg of the fourth set. The Scot then missed another six darts in the third leg to allow Barneveld the fourth set without conceding to win the match 4-0, setting up a quarter final tie against Simon Whitlock.
There was a little niggle between Lewis and Painter during their match. Lewis did have a 95 average, his best of the tournament so far. He looked bang in form in the opening set, taking it without conceding. Painter looked to level with the second set by taking a 2-1 lead. But Lewis fought back to force a deciding leg which he also took to double his advantage.
It looked like it would be deja vu in the third set when Painter again went 2-0 ahead in the third set only for Lewis to again force a deciding leg. But this time Painter managed to hold his nerve to half the deficit. The fourth set again saw Painter take a 2-0 lead. But a 109 and a 100-checkout from Lewis forced another deciding leg. But again Painter managed to take it to level the match.
After conceding the first leg in the fifth set, Lewis took a 2-1 lead. Painter then missed two darts to force a deciding set, allowing Lewis to win the set 3-1. Lewis then took another four legs to win the sixth set by the same scoreline to win the match 4-2.
This sets up an extremely mouth watering quarter final tie against Van Gerwen after his victory over Lloyd. The Dutchman was suffering injuries to his feet which clearly made him limp but it didn't affect him too much. Lloyd went 2-1 ahead in the opening set only for Van Gerwen to fight back and win the set with a 116-checkout.
The Dutchman then made it five consecutive legs to go 2-0 ahead in sets, which included a 121-checkout. That became six legs before Lloyd finally stopped the rot and ended up taking the third set 3-1. Van Gerwen went 2-0 ahead in the fourth set before Lloyd missed three darts to level the set, giving Van Gerwen a 3-1 lead. That became 4-1 three legs later as the Dutchman took the fifth set without conceding and came out with a 98-average.
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