"I can already see the headlines..." - Michael van Gerwen tipped for shock Grand Slam exit despite signs of a revival

Michael van Gerwen has been tipped for a shock group-stage exit at the 2026 Grand Slam of Darts, despite recent signs that the three-time champion could be rediscovering his best form. Jeffrey de Graaf has been backed to eliminate the Dutchman in Wolverhampton, where a new tournament format leaves little margin for error.

Van Gerwen arrives having reached the semi-finals and quarter-finals of the final two Players Championship events of the season, including a stunning 114.15 average against Danny Noppert. Yet his struggles to reproduce that level consistently on television have raised doubts about whether the improvement will carry over to a tournament he once dominated.

Speaking on the latest DartsNews Podcast, Samuel Gill identified De Graaf as a serious threat in Group L, which also features non-Tour Card holder ProTour winner Henry Coates.

"This is a big danger for Van Gerwen, especially with De Graaf. He's a brilliant player, very underrated. I can already see the headlines of him beating Van Gerwen at the Grand Slam," Gill said.

"There's going to be a lot of talk about the fact that he's been playing on the ProTour recently, averaging 114 and seemingly finding a bit of his mojo again. But whether he can do that on the big stage, the jury is still very much out because he hasn't for the past six months at least. There's big jeopardy."

Van Gerwen won three consecutive Grand Slam titles between 2015 and 2017, defeating Phil Taylor, James Wade and Peter Wright in successive finals. He reached the semi-finals again in 2018 and 2019, but has not returned to the last four since.

His more recent appearances have been less convincing. A group-stage elimination followed in 2024 before he reached the last 16 in 2025, losing 10-6 to Danny Noppert after needing a final group victory over Gary Anderson to secure his place in the knockouts.

The 2026 season has brought further frustration. Early defeats at the World Grand Prix and European Championship have contributed to the former world number one's slide outside the top ten on the PDC Order of Merit, while he also missed the Premier League play-offs for the second successive season.

There have still been reminders of his ability. Van Gerwen won the Bahrain Darts Masters and Nordic Darts Masters earlier in the year, alongside a Players Championship title in May.

His most encouraging recent performance came at Players Championship 33 on 4 November, when he whitewashed Noppert 6-0 with a 114.15 average before losing 7-5 to Niels Zonneveld in the semi-finals. He followed that with a quarter-final appearance the next day, eventually losing 6-3 to Luke Humphries.

De Graaf has already demonstrated that he can beat Van Gerwen, recording a 6-4 victory over him at Players Championship 25 in July, with both players averaging above 105.

That tournament offers another connection between the three Group L opponents. De Graaf went on to reach the semi-finals, where he lost 7-3 to Coates. The 20-year-old then defeated Damon Heta in the final to become one of the few non-Tour Card holders to win a PDC ranking title.

Coates has struggled to maintain that standard consistently, only securing the final qualifying place for the Players Championship Finals by £250. His breakthrough nevertheless makes him more than an unfamiliar third name in the group.

"He won a ProTour title but only just qualified for Minehead," Gill observed. "He played the rest of the ProTour events after winning that title, but didn't really do a lot with it. I'm not sure what he'll bring to the big stage."

It is De Graaf, however, who Gill expects to take the group's only knockout place. "I see De Graaf winning that group. I'm going to be typically me and say he'll come through, and Van Gerwen will go out early. So prove me wrong, MVG. Bring it on."

Not everyone shared Gill's doubts about the former world number one. "I'm actually going to back Michael in this group. I think he'll get the job done," Nicolas Gayer said on the DartsNews Podcast. "These huge names, these icons of our sport, usually manage to get their foot in the door at some point and stop things going the wrong way all the time. I think this will be the one. It's a good group for him. Of course, Jeffrey can be tricky. He's a really good player, but Michael should be able to beat him."

Gayer also saw potential danger in the relatively unknown Coates. "He can play phenomenal darts, as we've seen. You don't win a title on the ProTour without a Tour Card otherwise," he said. "We don't really know what to expect from him, but I think this is a good group for Michael. I think he'll win both games and win the group."

Kieran Wood also backed Van Gerwen to progress, although he challenged the recurring expectation of a comeback following a difficult year. "We've been saying that about Van Gerwen all year, and all year he's failed to get that foot in the door," Wood pointed out.

Unlike the World Matchplay or World Grand Prix, where an opening defeat means immediate elimination, the Grand Slam's round-robin stage guarantees every player two matches.

The expansion to 48 players has nevertheless introduced a more unforgiving qualification system. Only the winners of the 16 three-player groups advance to the last 16, meaning a single defeat could leave even a leading seed dependent on leg difference and other results.

"The Grand Slam is perhaps the best format for him to get into his darts," Gill explained. "Often he loses at the Matchplay or World Grand Prix, where he only gets one first-round match. Here, if he's going to do it, he gets two games."

"In the past, he might have had three games where he could win the first two, take his foot off the gas in the third and still go through. He doesn't have that opportunity now, but he still gets more than one game to do it."

Gill also raised the possibility that facing De Graaf and Coates could bring a different response from Van Gerwen. "Having tough opposition in Jeffrey de Graaf and then Henry Coates as a bit of an unknown could give him that fire in his belly to prove a point," he suggested. "I'm hoping he does because I've always been a big admirer of Van Gerwen, and I hope he gets back to his best."

Van Gerwen opens his Grand Slam campaign against Coates on Saturday evening, with his meeting against De Graaf to follow. Those two best-of-nine matches will determine whether the three-time champion returns to the knockout stages or suffers a second group-stage elimination in three years.