Doubles win titles: The five best checkout performances in World Grand Prix history

The World Grand Prix double-start format makes the checkout percentage the single most decisive metric of any PDC major. Needing a double to open every leg before scoring begins and another to close it, winners of this tournament are dependent on their doubling across the week, as missing doubles can limit not just the end of legs but also their scoring power.

In the 27-year history of this tournament, the five best checkout performances by winners have all ended with a checkout percentage of 50%, from the lowest of 50.11% to the highest of 55.70% across the winning week. Players can score brilliantly, but without a double it's talent wasted, and they need a double to open every leg before scoring begins and another to close it; players show that in the World Grand Prix: doubles win titles. With no player averaging above 97.81 in adjusted metrics, these five represent the clearest example of that principle producing a World Grand Prix Champion.

Robert Thornton claimed the World Grand Prix title in 2015 in one of, if not the best, double-start finals ever. Beating the previous year's champion, Michael Van Gerwen, in the final, the Scotsman picked up his last of three PDC major titles in impressive form. From 123 attempts, the Thorn pinned 58 doubles, giving him a marginally above-half checkout percentage that brought success. But this high percentage doesn’t mean it was a solid 50% in the semi-final or final: Thornton missed 20 doubles of 34 attempts against Suljovic in the semi-final and 19 against MVG, with the first rounds producing the goods.

In the first round and quarter-finals against Gurney and White, he posted a 66.7% and 54.17% checkout rate; purely lethal on the outer ring. Yet, doubles wasn’t the only thing going right for Thornton. A striking 90.79 average in a double-start tournament and a first nine of 107.24 allowed the 2012 UK Open champion to get to the clinical finishing quicker than his opponent. This is the best illustration of what the World Grand Prix rewards and punishes. Strong scoring and world-class finishing secure titles.

In the semi-final, Thornton had a lower checkout percentage against Suljovic, with the Austrian producing a 46.15% checkout percentage, but the first 9 were 13 points higher, showing the versatility of Thornton’s winning campaign. When doubles were below par, his scoring helped, and vice versa. The final outlines the same method: although MVG hit double Thornton’s 180s with 18, Thornton missed 19 doubles compared to MVG's 42. A 13-percentage-point gap that secured the title.

Stronger competition means mounting pressure, which many contribute to a falling checkout percentage. Thornton defied this: a run of Gurney, Pipe, Ian White, Suljovic, and Van Gerwen in the final, his work was cut out. In the first round, Thornton’s functional doubles (a statistical metric that tracks a player's checkout attempts at a double, discarding any missed darts that do not actually risk losing the leg or letting the opponent back to the board) against Gurney were perfect, meaning the other three missed doubles by no means impacted the scoreline. It was just a bruising due to his doubles.

Similar in the quarter-finals, where a 54.17% checkout percentage was the difference. In the tightest match of the run, the checkout percentage forced a last-leg decider where, despite “missing” the bullseye after setting up for Double 20 on a 161 outshot, Thornton’s doubling, mixed with strong scoring, didn’t just beat White; it was the embodiment of Thornton’s run. Thornton's 2015 run was not the most statistically dominant in this list. It sits fifth. But it might be the most complete illustration of what the World Grand Prix actually rewards. Strong scoring when the doubles dried up. Clinical finishing when the scoring was modest. Never needing both simultaneously. That is why he is on it.

The 6-time winner of the World Grand Prix produced his most complete finishing performance in 2018, posting up a 52.73% checkout percentage in his 5 games. Hitting 53 doubles from 115 attempts, 2018 was arguably the last time we saw complete Dutch domination of the PDC. Winning not just the World Grand Prix but also the World Masters and Premier League and the World Championship at the turn of 2019 demonstrated that the doubling performance didn’t just come from his familiarity in the World Grand Prix but from his overall performance in the year. In the tournament, the average does not show Van Gerwen in the best light: 88.85. But the first nine is what demonstrates the brilliance of this run: 114.27.

A player finishing over half of his doubles whilst hitting on average more than 1 treble per scoring visit will win titles. Unlike many players on this list, Van Gerwen’s fantastic double percentage is carried by his first-round game. Hitting 6/7 doubles, this 85.71% brings the overall average up, with the best doubles percentage in this run being 50% against Chisnall in the quarter-finals. Identical to Thornton, Mighty Mike hit a perfect functional double in his first round against Irishman Steven Lennon and won all six legs in a complete domination. Is this any surprise, however, as if a player is going to hit an 114 first nine and hit all his doubles, Lennon’s best choice was to be a bystander of brilliance. In his whole run, though, his doubles, explicitly demonstrating why he won the title, were in his quarter-finals against Chisnall. With Chizzy’s first nine at 119.94 against the Dutchman’s 117.29, Van Gerwen won this game by converting 50% of his doubles against the Englishman’s 30%. What sticks out about Michael Van Gerwen in this list is his first nine of 114.27.

This scoring power creates pressure on the opponents, meaning that no matter his double percentage, although the impressive 52.73%, it gave him chances to miss and not be punished. This is seen in the semi-final and final, where despite a 48% and 39.02% checkout percentage in the semi-final and final, Van Gerwen won both games with a 3-set margin due to his scoring power. The final against Wright tells the story most clearly. Wright averaged 91.61 to Van Gerwen's 88.85 and finished at 48.15% to Van Gerwen's 39.02% in the decider, outscored him, outfinished him and still lost 5-2. The first nine of 114.27 had already done the damage. By the time Wright was at a double, Van Gerwen had reduced the leg to a formality often enough that the missed doubles in the final simply did not matter. 2018 was not won at the double. It was won three darts before it. The 52.73% was the cherry on top, making the 2018 win his most complete World Grand Prix title to date.

The 11-time winner of this tournament was bound to be on this list somewhere, and his 2008 campaign secured his position in a competitive list. Hitting 64 doubles from 120 attempts and a tournament average of 97.81, prime Phil Taylor was no man to mess with in a doubles format. To put into perspective the scale of that average, the double-in format means the top score in the first 3 darts is 161, 19 points lower than the maximum score of 180, and not just this, missed doubles to start the leg count from 0 to the average.

The mean winning average at the World Grand Prix sits between the high eighties and low nineties. A seven- to eight-point improvement shows that Taylor's record of eleven titles makes him the most decorated player in the tournament's history, and this 2008 campaign was the finest week of that record. Specifically, Taylor’s first nine of 113.87 cruised him to the title, dropping just three sets over his run. Most striking is his quarter-final checkout percentage; in a 4-1 battering of Andy Hamilton, Taylor hit 13/19 doubles, making a checkout percentage of 68.42%.

In five sets, this level of consistency is almost everything you would need to know about his run. In the first two rounds, he won five sets and didn’t drop one, and in the semi-final, he beat Terry Jenkins, himself a very proven World Grand Prix player, reaching two finals in 2006 and 2007. In that semi-final, Phil Taylor produced a mind-blowing 122.21 first nine and a first three of 136.22. This was the most dominant performance ever in the World Grand Prix; the 122.21 first nine overshadowed an already impressive 50% checkout in the same match.

In the final, the Power converted 21 doubles from 39, almost matching his event checkout percentage of 53.85%. Van Barneveld matched this with a 50% checkout hit rate but lost by 4 sets and was subject to Taylor in his prime. Winning the Premier League this year, the European Championships, the World Matchplay and the Champions League of Darts, and the World Grand Prix was one of many in this era. 2008’s run is the most complete performance potentially any major has seen.

The highest tournament average, 180 count, dominant semi-final and still a 53.04% win rate. Taylor scored better than his finishing, and this speaks volumes, as he arrived at these doubles from aggressive scoring positions, and although two players are above him on this list, neither produced the same overall level of darts as the 16-time World Champion.

James Wade's 2010 World Grand Prix title is the most extreme case study of what this format produces. Averaging just 88.81 across the week, the lowest of any player on this list, and hitting only three 180s across five matches, Wade won the World Grand Prix on the back of his doubling alone. From 131 attempts, the machine converted 67, giving him a 53.85% checkout rate that places him second on this list. The contrast between his scoring and his finishing is the defining statistical story of this run. His first nine of 97.79 is the lowest in this top five, meaning his scoring visits were the most modest of any winner here, yet he converted more doubles per attempt than Taylor, MVG and Thornton.

The Last 16 against Colin Osborne is where the run truly announced itself. Converting 11 from 14 attempts for a 78.57% checkout rate, the highest single-round checkout percentage of any player across all five entries in this list, Wade produced a perfect functional doubles percentage of 100%, converting every double he reached. In the quarter-final against Hamilton, he hit 63.16%, and in the final against Adrian Lewis, he posted 51.22% from 41 attempts, winning 6-3 despite Lewis averaging 89.33 to his 88.81. Lewis outscored him and lost by three sets.

The first round against Mick McGowan told a different story. A 31.58% checkout rate from 19 attempts is the lowest opening-round checkout of any player on this list, yet Wade won 2-0 because McGowan converted just 25% himself. The format punishes missed doubles, but it punishes both players equally, and McGowan's 25% made Wade's 31.58% look clinical by comparison.

This is the pattern that defines Wade's entire run: his doubling was not always elite, but it was consistently better than the player standing opposite him. In the semi-final against Van Barneveld, across 27 legs and 38 double attempts, Wade converted 44.74%. RvB hit 50% in the same match and still lost 5-1. The scoring difference was marginal, but the set count was not. Wade's 2010 title is the purest proof that in this format, being better at the double than your opponent across a week is enough to win the World Grand Prix, regardless of what the average says.

Jonny Clayton's 2021 World Grand Prix title produced the highest checkout rate of any winner in the tournament's 27-year history. From 116 attempts across five matches, the Ferret converted 60 doubles for a 55.70% checkout rate that sits 1.85 percentage points above Wade in second place. With just four 180s across the week, the second lowest on this list alongside Wade's three, Clayton won the World Grand Prix without ever being the dominant scorer in any of his five matches.

What he was, consistently and almost without exception, was the better finisher. His checkout rate improved in each of his first three rounds: 60% in the first round against Rydz, 64.71% in the Last 16 against De Sousa and 68.42% in the quarter-final against Ratajski, matching Taylor's quarter-final percentage from 2008. Three consecutive rounds of improving precision at the double is the clearest statistical progression of any player in this list. In the quarter-final against Ratajski, his functional doubles percentage of 86.67% from 15 attempts produced a 3-2 win in the tightest match of his run, with the checkout being the deciding factor across the final set.

The semi-final against Noppert is the one blemish. Across 32 double attempts, Clayton hit only 40.63%, his lowest checkout round of the week by a significant margin. He still won 4-1 because Noppert converted just 26.92% of his own attempts. In the final against Price, both players finished below their weekly average checkout percentage, Clayton at 44.74% and Price at 40%, yet Clayton won 5-1.

The scoreline is the most dominant final result in this top five, alongside Taylor's 6-2 in 2008. Four 180s across five matches. Never the highest scorer in any of his matches. Never needing to be. The World Grand Prix in 2021 was won by the player who wasted the fewest doubles across an entire week. That is what this format demands above everything else. Clayton answered it more completely than anyone in the tournament's 27-year history, and that is why he sits at the top of this list.