Jonny Clayton has won a leg of the shootout in the decider to edge past Mickey Mansell and book his third place in the PDC World Cup after an epic clash at Alexandra Palace.
Mansell, who in his run to the semi-finals of the Grand Slam of . impressed weaponsthat Clayton had vindicated to pay the double shots against the arrows. Walls, though, fought back to hit a stunning straight leg six – including a 100 checkout with a top finish – to turn the match around.
Despite plenty of misfires, Northern Ireland’s Mansell dug in in the fourth set and capitalized on scoring from Clayton to level things up at 2-2.
In the final set, Mansell made successive monster runs of 136 and 154 to leave Clayton on the brink of the first outs, but the 50-year-old was held off by Llanelli with a 70 checkout before a clinical 114 to finish 2-2 on legs. . Super leg 10-shot then put the seed 3-2 ahead of the seventh.
Clayton missed three shots for the match – one in the bullpen and two in the double eight – and allowed Mansell to tie the game at 3-3. Mansell broke in front and dropped his shot to the top, with Clayton squaring things up to take a 5-4 lead. Aided by the first 180 of the match, Mansell drove the leg in sudden death, which Clayton, with a useful first throw, eventually wrapped up with a double five.
In Monday’s afternoon session match, PDC Asian Tour leader Alexis Toylo saw his hopes dashed with a 3-1 defeat against Krzysztof Ratajski. Filipino star Toylo had marked his tournament debut with a first-round tie against Richard Veenstra, but after scoring a big 160 in the opening set, he found it tough against the 31st seed from Poland. Ratajski took a 2-0 lead before giving up any hope of a comeback from Toylo to a showdown against Kevin Doets, who caused an upset in the final round by beating No. 2 seed Michael Smith.
Former UK Open qualifier Andrew Gilding sent six majors to beat Grand Slam of Darts runner-up Martin Lukeman 3-1 to advance to the third round, where he will beat Nathan Aspinall, while Josh Rock, the 18th seed; Debutant Rhys Griffin was relegated to a 3-0 victory – he missed a possible 19-shot finish in the third set when he failed to hit the seventh triple 20. Rock – who claimed his first European Tour title at the Dutch Championship. this year – he continues to meet Christ Dobey, the 2023 Masters champion, in the last 16th place.