Tabern survives late comeback from Smith to set up round two clash with Van Gerwen

Tabern went two-nil up in sets but missed match darts before the comeback from Smith. Despite that though when it went into a decider he wrestled the contest back to set up a tie with Michael van Gerwen in Round Two. Tabern ended up taking the first set three-one with ‘The Saint’ marking his return to the Alexandra Palace stage in style. He extended his lead to two-nil in sets following this with a brilliant 71 checkout to cap it all off. He went on though to miss multiple match darts in the following set and this allowed a route back into the match for Smith. The Aussie then went on to tie the match up at 2 sets all to force a decider in a similar script to the first game. From there Tabern went 2-0 up in the deciding set and then completed the job to survive a real scare. for more information about the PDC World Darts Championship, including schedules and the prize fund breakdown. Friday December 14 Afternoon Session (1230) Michael Barnard (88.08) 3-2 (87.83) Jose De Sousa (R1) Alan Tabern (91.12) 3 (5) 2 (86.14) Raymond Smith (R1) Paul Nicholson v Kevin Burness (R1) Jamie Lewis v Cody Harris (R2)