Biggest absentees from this year’s PDC World Darts Championship

While the top names are involved at this year’s PDC World Darts Championship, there are also some high profile absentees which we look at ahead of the showpiece tournament beginning in just under two weeks time.

The highest placed absentee from this year’s tournament is World No.39, Jeffrey de Zwaan. The Dutchman has been at the Alexandra Palace for the last three editions, where he narrowly lost to eventual world champion Peter Wright two years ago in the last sixteen.

It will not often happen that a winner of a television tournament that same year is missing from the World Darts Championship. John Henderson won the World Cup of Darts with Wright a few months ago, but did not have a good season individually. There is even a slim chance that the Scot will lose his PDC Tour Card after the World Championship.

The latter also applies to Max Hopp, who is also missing from the World Darts Championship. Hopp played eight of the last nine World Championships , while Henderson played nine of the last ten.

Steve West is out for the first time since the 2016 edition. Two years ago, he was even one of the seeds, but this year he did not go further than 105th in the Pro Tour ranking.

Keegan Brown is also a notable absentee, having missed just one in the past seven years. The other absentees from the top 64 of the world rankings are Andy Boulton, Scott Waites and Mickey Mansell.