Bunting claims commanding victory over Van den Bergh, De Sousa through on debut with win over Richardson

Bunting was excellent in wrapping up a commanding victory over Dimitri van den Bergh to begin the proceedings in the afternoon session. It ended up 6-2 to 'The Bullet' who despite 'The Dreammaker's big stage prowess blew him away.

For the St Helens ace he pounced early on missed doubles to go 2-1 up with a break of throw and held throw to extend that to 3-1. At the interval, it was four consecutive legs for him as he moved into a 4-1 lead.

He moved 5-1 up and despite Van den Bergh stopping the rot to reduce the deficit at 5-2 down; but he moved through in a 6-2 win.

De Sousa survived a late comeback from James Richardson to claim a 6-3 win to mark an excellent Players Championship Finals debut.

The Portuguese ace went into a 3-1 lead in the early going but a break back saw Richardson close the gap to 3-2.

Despite that though, De Sousa smashed in an excellent 121 checkout to break throw and move 5-3 up and towards the finishing line. It was one he reached as he joined the second round line-up.

Over on Stage Two, there were victories for Darius Labanauskas and Mervyn King with both claiming nail biting 6-5 victories.

Labanauskas defeated ranking winner Harry Ward with a high checkout of 141; while King came back from 4-3 down against Justin Pipe, where the latter hit 124 and 130 checkouts to win 6-5 in a decider with a 100.7 average.

Dimitri Van den Bergh (89.65) 2-6 (94.55) Stephen Bunting
Jose de Sousa (91.09) 6-3 (91.91) James Richardson
14:00 Glen Durrant v Scott Baker
14:30 Max Hopp v Jelle Klaasen
15:00 Chris Dobey v Cristo Reyes
15:30 Jeffrey de Zwaan v Simon Whitlock
16:00 Michael Smith v Martin Schindler
16:30 Ian White v Devon Petersen

Harry Ward (90.31) 5-6 (90.95) Darius Labanauskas
Justin Pipe (94.61) 5-6 (101.05) Mervyn King
14:00 Brendan Dolan v Ross Smith
14:30 John Henderson v Ryan Joyce
15:00 Keegan Brown v Andy Boulton
15:30 Steve Beaton v Ricky Evans
16:00 Danny Noppert v Ryan Searle
16:30 Dave Chisnall v Matthew Edgar

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