Phil Taylor and Raymond van Barneveld now occupy the top two places in the Premier League!
Taylor thrashed James Wade 8-1, while Barney looked good again in his victory over Gary Anderson in Brighton.
The top four reads: Taylor (12 pts), Barneveld (10 pts), Anderson (8 pts) and Lewis (7 pts)
But Wade stays bottom of the table after running into Taylor, who is back to his very best…..that was proved again with an average of 107.5
“I feel good,” Taylor said. “It is getting tougher, that’s for sure, because we are all after each other. We are like pack animals and that’s the way you have to be.”
Wade just couldn’t keep up with Taylor….it was relentless.
Taylor raced into a 3-0 advantage, hitting three 180s, two 12 darters and a 100 finish with two double ‘tops’! Wade had missed the same out-shot but did get a leg on the board, hitting D10.
But that’s as good as it got for Wade….a 121 check-out on the bull made it 4-1, two more 12 darters followed and Taylor took his 180 tally to six.
He really has put his bad four months of form well and truly behind him.
Barney’s impressive run of form continued as he condemned Anderson to a third straight defeat.
The Dutchman banged in an average of 101.44 and looks on course to qualify for those semi-finals.
“I am enjoying my darts at the moment,” he said. “I have won five out of seven games in the Premier League so far, so it is a good position to be in going into the second half of the event.”
Of course, Barneveld lost to Taylor and that 113.60 average in the final of the RTL7 International Masters tournament in Holland and the pair will clash again in Cardiff in week eight of PL Darts….1st against 2nd!
After missing six darts to win the opening leg and falling 2-0 behind, Barneveld starting to click through the gears….they were tied at three apiece at the break after Anderson followed a 180 with a 121 finish on the bull to level the game.
Anderson looked out-of-sorts, but take nothing away from Barney, because the Unicorn man looks relaxed on the stage and it is showing in his game.
He won three legs on the spin to move 6-3 in front and although the Scot threatened a comeback when he got to within a leg, Barney broke again and D16 clinched an impressive win.
The other all Unicorn affair in Brighton threw up the first draw of the 2011 Premier League….the 26th match of this year’s tournament.
In the end though, Adrian Lewis will feel like it is a point dropped, because he was 6-3 up before Terry Jenkins battled back to snatch the draw.
After the opening four legs were shared, Jenkins broke first, only for Lewis to hit back with a 101 check-out. In fact the World Champion won four consecutive legs to open up that 6-3 advantage.
But ‘The Bull’ is a fighter and three straight legs proved that! Lewis secured his point with D4 after he hit 170 to set up the finish, but he didn’t get a dart to win it, because Jenkins’ third 180 put him in control of that final leg and D5 secured the draw.
While Lewis was obviously disappointed to miss out on the win, Jenkins was more than happy with the draw, as he was playing with new darts in Brighton.
“The bookies keep writing me off and that suits me just fine. We are just at the halfway mark in the competition and I still have a great chance of getting through to the semi-finals. It’s in my own hands,” said Jenkins.
In the night’s other match, Simon Whitlock averaged 104.5 in demolishing Mark Webster 8-2….the Australian’s win included finishes of 140 and 120
Brighton week seven results:
Mark Webster 2-8 Simon Whitlock
Adrian Lewis 7-7 Terry Jenkins
Raymond van Barneveld 8-5 Gary Anderson
Phil Taylor 8-1 James Wade
By STUART PYKE
Photos courtesy Lawrence Lustig / PDC