With Larry Butler and Darin Young exiting the event on Thursday, American interest in the event remained strictly as a neutral.  Although Butler and Young lost to the highly fancied Peter Wright and Gary Anderson, I suspect that many onlookers were looking at the the Dutch pair of Michael van Gerwen and Raymond van Barneveld as the eventual winners – and that is just the way it turned out.

With England (Rob Cross and Dave Chisnall) dipping out to Belgium (Kim Huybrechts and Dimitri Van den Bergh) in the quarter-finals, the three remaining Top Four seeds dominated the semis.  Scotland reached the penultimate stage by defeating Japan without dropping a single leg.  There they faced the fourth-seeded Aussie team of Simon Whitlock and Kyle Anderson.  The men from Down Under reached the Top Four thanks to a hard-fought victory over Wales.  In the bottom half of the bracket, MVG and RVB beat hosts Germany, and took on their near-neighbors Belgium.

The first team to reach the final were the Scots, and what a close one that was!  Wright beat Whitlock 4-3, and Kyle Anderson repeated that scoreline against his namesake Gary.  That took the match to a deciding doubles contest, and in another close one that went all the way, Scotland grabbed the all-important seventh leg.

The other semi saw the Dutch pair pocket the win without needing to go to the doubles, van Gerwen beating Huybrechts 4-2, and Barney doing the same against Van den Bergh.  This last clash turned out to be something of a classic, with RVB posting an average of 113.38, while the Belgian “struggled” with an average of 107.54!

On to the final, and Van Gerwen gave the Netherlands a great start by seeing off Wright.  Barney couldn’t repeat the magic of the semi-final, and slumped to a disappointing 4-1 loss to Anderson.  All square at 1-1, MVG and RVB powered to an impressive 4-1 triumph in the doubles.  Anderson now had the dubious task of having to beat van Gerwen to keep Scotland in the tournament, but it took just four legs for the Dutch to win the PDC’s World Cup of Darts for a record-equalling fourth time.

Another fascinating weekend, and before I go, a special mention for a man who has represented the US with distinction on many occasions – Singapore’s Paul Lim – who recorded a famous singles victory against World Champ Rob Cross!

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