James Wade beaten by Keegan Brown and Dave Chisnall loses to Vincent van der Voort
Written by News on 18/12/2017
James Wade and Dave Chisnall became the latest and highest profile seeds to crash out of the World Darts Championship on Sunday night.
With six seeds already down going into Sunday’s evening session, The Machine and Chizzy made it three of the world’s top 12 sent packing inside the opening four days.
Wade, who last crashed out at this stage in 2006, was first to fall, losing out 3-2 in a thrilling encounter with world No 58 Keegan Brown, the 2014 World Youth Champion and medical laboratory assistant currently seeking additional leave from work to practice for the second round.
Within an hour, multiple major winner and world No 11 Wade was joined by world No 8 Chisnall in heading home before Christmas as Dutch fan favourite Vincent van der Voort dispatched a below-par Chizzy 3-0.
For both Wade and Chisnall the year ends in the most disappointing of fashions, with the pair having mustered little in the way of major performances a first-round exit will do little to enhance their claims of a return to the Premier League.
All the headlines will go to Brown, who has failed to kick on since beating Rowby-John Rodriguez to claim the World Youth title in 2014, but a blistering start saw him reel of the first three legs including a fine 124 finish.
Wade stopped the rot with the opening leg of the second set, double top settling him into the contest but Brown was undaunted, a clinical 70 levelled up and with the pair trading big finishes, The Machine took out 72 to level.
With Wade on the brink, an assured fourth set from him ensured the match went the distance, before the final act that saw Brown into the second round, where he faces Zoran Lerchbacher, with hopes high of a career-best run at Alexandra Palace.
At the other end of the age scale, Van der Voort put injury and career concerns behind behind to roll back the years with a demolition of Chisnall.
The 41-year-old admitted last year that he considered giving up the game and underwent a couple of hernia operations but he looked back to his quickfire best – much to the delight of the crowd who treated him to several rousing renditions of his walk-on song.
On the oche a 56 per cent finishing display to go with six 180s and an average a shade under 100 was too good for Chisnall, who suffered his first fall at the first hurdle since 2014.
In the final match of the evening, 17th seed Ian White ensured it was not a clean sweep of defeats for the seeds, overcoming a battling display from preliminary round winner Cody Harris, who beat American policeman Willard Bruguier.
The New Zealander briefly threatened White when he leveled the match at one set apiece before the more experienced man rallied to ease through the next two sets thanks to a critical 94 in the third that swung the match back his way.
White ran out a 3-1 winner and will next face Gerwyn Price, with the winner of that match likely to meet Michael van Gerwen in the third round.
Earlier in the day, Jamie Lewis became the first player from the preliminary round to book a place in the second round, following up his 2-1 win over Kenny Neyens in the first match of the afternoon session with a brilliant 3-0 victory over Jonny Clayton in the final match.
Players Championship runner-up and 31st seed Clayton was no match for Lewis, who produced his best performance on the Alexandra Palace stage to average 99.02 and send his fellow Welshman packing.
Joining Lewis in the second round are Alan Norris and Kyle Anderson, who gave the seeds a boost after Saturday’s shock results.
Anderson was not as his best but proved too strong for Peter Jacques while 2016 quarter-finalist ‘Chuck’ Norris was too strong for Finland’s Kim Viljanen.
The 2018 World Championship from Alexandra Palace continues on Monday night with coverage underway on Sky Sports Darts from 7pm
Keep up to date with the news as the PDC celebrates 25 years on Sky Sports. So get all the latest at www.skysports.com/darts and join in the conversation @SkySportsDarts – don’t forget to use #LoveTheDarts.
(c) Sky News 2017: James Wade beaten by Keegan Brown and Dave Chisnall loses to Vincent van der Voort
