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MICHAEL VAN GERWEN suffered a second successive first-round elimination, facing defeat against world No. 71 in the Players Championship.
The Dutch former world champion was outperformed by Welsh player Rhys Griffin in Leicester.
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In the initial round of the Leicester double-header, seven-time Players Championship champion Van Gerwen was knocked out by a compatriot.
He narrowly lost 6-5 in a gripping contest against Maik Kuivenhoven, and he wasn’t the only notable competitor to exit early; Gerwyn Price also succumbed 6-4 to Rob Owen.
Regrettably for Van Gerwen, he couldn’t rebound in the following match, facing an unexpected 6-3 loss to Griffin while averaging just 89.
Griffin averaged 93, securing the most significant win of his career with an impressive 14-darter, leading Van Gerwen to endure his second consecutive first-round exit.
This early departure signifies the first instance since 2011 that he hasn’t progressed to the last four in any of the first 12 Players Championship events.
The distinguished 47-time PDC major champion has been struggling to regain his form due to a neck injury that forced him to miss last week’s Premier League Darts event in Berlin.
At 35, he sustained an unusual injury while putting on a shirt, which resulted in him missing the ninth night of Premier League action at the Uber Arena in the German capital, where he was scheduled to play against Gerwyn Price in a highly anticipated quarter-final.
That night, beloved player Stephen Bunting emerged victorious, as ‘The Bullet’, currently ranked No. 4 globally, defeated Price in the final, continuing his exceptional form to win the International Darts Open, marking his inaugural PDC European Tour title.
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Presently, Van Gerwen is in third place in the Premier League standings, with only one point’s difference between him and his challengers. However, a victory during night 10 at the AO Arena on April 10 in Manchester could help him regain his competitive spirit.
Van Gerwen has a chance to bounce back from two unforeseen defeats when he encounters Chris Dobey.
In other quarter-final matchups, Nathan Aspinall will face Rob Cross, Luke Littler will compete against Gerwyn Price, and top seed Luke Humphries is seeking revenge against Bunting after falling to him in the semi-finals in Riesa.
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