Christian Kist and Alexander Merkx qualify for World Darts Championship

Two Dutchmen have qualified for the 2025 World Darts Championship via the PDC Challenge Tour. Christian Kist and Alexander Merkx earned an appearance at Alexandra Palace with their performances.

The Challenge Tour is, so to speak, the second division of the PDC. Players who participated in the Q-School, but did not win a PDC Tour Card there, are allowed to compete on this tour. The circuit consists of a series of 24 tournaments. All performances are recorded in a ranking, and the top two players in that ranking receive an invitation to the World Darts Championship.

Connor Scutt and Wesley Plaisier were the top two players, but had already qualified for the World Darts Championship through the PDC Pro Tour. That meant the two Ally Pally places were pushed on to numbers three and four. Kist finished third on the Challenge Tour Order of Merit, while Merkx seized the fourth spot after winning his second title last weekend.

For Kist, it will be his ninth participation at a world championship. He made his debut at Lakeside in 2012, where the Dutchman sensationally became world champion as a qualifier. In the following two years, he was eliminated in the first round of Lakeside. Then "The Lipstick" made the move to the PDC, where he made it to Alexandra Palace four times in a row. Last year, after six years, Kist made his return to the World Darts Championship, where he lost in the first round to teenage sensation Luke Littler.

For Merkx, it will be his debut at the World Darts Championship at Alexandra Palace. At the end of 2023, "Alexander the Great," as his nickname goes, did compete in the WDF World Championship. There he lost to Dennis Nilsson in the last sixteen. Merkx had also qualified for the upcoming edition of the WDF World Championship, but his participation in the PDC's World Darts Championship will put a line through that.