"For the first time in quite a while I fancy England" - Richard Ashdown excited by Luke Humphries & Michael Smith World Cup combination
PDCTuesday, 25 June 2024 at 10:00
The 2024 World Cup of Darts will get underway next Thursday in Frankfurt. England starts the tournament as the number one seed and as such, the pre tournament favourites.
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Representing England this time around are the duo of Luke Humphries and Michael Smith. For Humphries, it will be his debut at the World Cup of Darts; for Smith, it is already his fifth participation. "The way they play, the pace of it, I think both are really looking forward to playing with the other," previews PDC spotter and former Lakeside Master of Ceremonies Richard Ashdown on the Sky Sports Love the Darts podcast.
"For Luke Humphries, despite being world champion and world number one, there's still a lot of things that are new to him," Ashdown notes, with Cool Hand Luke also having recently made his Premier League Darts debut. On that occasion, Humphries excelled, finishing 2nd in the league table and then going on to lose out in the final to Luke Littler. "None of us now how he's going to take to this format. Personally, I think he's going to love it, but we shall see."
England has won the World Cup of Darts four times already, each time with Adrian Lewis and Phil Taylor.
So, does Ashdown feel the combination of Humphries and Smith is good duo? "I do," he answers firmly. "I think also, we need to remember how much Luke Humphries wanted to be in this event last year. That was all the talk going into Euro Tour events wasn't it, for the rankings."
Michael Smith, however, has not been in top form in recent months. "For Michael, he is at that point of the year, where he's most relaxed and gearing up for what is to come. So because of the mindset for those two, for the first time in quite a while I fancy England," Ashdown concludes his analysis. We don't have long to find out if Humphries and Smith will click!
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Kieran WoodDarts Journalist
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He contributes to DartsNews.com, where he covers professional darts through news, match reports, analysis, and live coverage across the PDC calendar and major tournaments.
A key part of his work is on-site reporting from leading events. Kieran has covered the PDC World Darts Championship in person, reporting daily from the venue and providing first-hand insight from the tournament. During his coverage, he has conducted interviews with leading players including Luke Littler, Luke Humphries, and Gerwyn Price.
He is also one of the leading voices of the English-language Dartsnews Podcast, contributing regular analysis and discussion on developments across the professional darts circuit.
In his reporting, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles when new, verified information becomes available.
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- Not much of a tournament really,is it? Now they've all pulled out,it's open for everyone. I'm sure if you bought tickets,you'd be disappointed. Doesn't that seem to bother the withdrawals? Not at all!!rick6710-09-2026
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- I appreciate that littler is a fantastic player,but the top 3 articles are about him. Before he'd thrown a dart in the tournament. Level it out a bit, Taylor and van gerwen soon got disliked as the media could only see them,and nobody else seemed to matterrick6725-08-2026
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