Australian duo
Simon Whitlock and
Damon Heta are successfully through to the
World Cup of Darts second round after a superb display to dispel last year's finalists, William O'Connor and Steve Lennon of Republic of Ireland.
To begin the tie, O’Connor claimed
first blood with an immediate break of throw on double 20. But O’Connor missed
a dart at double 16 for a 112 and Whitlock return to break back.
Heta left double 20 in the
following leg in a dominant one for Australia and Whitlock pinned it to make it
2-1 and hold for the first time in the match.
Heta increased ‘The Heat’ by
pinning a 180 but a 128 from O’Connor left 134 for Ireland with Whitlock whittling
it down to 60. But the Brisbane Darts Master couldn’t pin it and O’Connor hit
the same target to hold.
Another 180 was hit by Heta
followed by a 134 from Whitlock which left Australia an 87 checkout to continue
their slender lead. Whitlock came back and hit a 60 checkout to take this.
Lennon busted a 52 checkout and
Heta took advantage with double eight to make it 4-2 and go one away with the
throw.
Whitlock and Heta both performed
superbly in the final leg leaving ‘The Wizard’ 80 but he went into six going
for double 10. The former pinned double one though soon after with Heta unable
finish proceedings.
Poland
are successfully through to the second round with the duo of
Krzysztof Ratajski
and
Krzysztof Kciuk making light work of South Africa’s Devon Petersen and Carl
Gabriel.
It
was a 5-0 whitewash for the experienced pairing who will look to emerge as a
danger. They restricted South Africa to not having a single dart at a double
throughout with Petersen not able to use his current form to anchor them home.
This disparity showed in the
statistics with Ratajski hitting a 93.44 average with Kciuk on 86.57. Petersen
hit 87.86 while Gabriel was on 76.75 on his World Cup of Darts debut.
World Cup of Darts 2020 schedule
Friday 6 November
Evening session (18:00 GMT)
Sweden (82.92) 0-5 (91.65) Greece
Japan (75.08) 3-5 (80.45) Scotland
Poland (90.54) 5-0 (82.73) South Africa
Republic of Ireland (93.12) 2-5 (92.52) Australia
Wales v Russia
Germany v Finland
Netherlands v Brazil
Hong Kong v Latvia