"I think it’s painful for anyone who has been following darts for a long time" – Vincent van der Voort sees worrying trend in Raymond van Barneveld’s game
PDC
Raymond van Barneveld is going through a particularly difficult phase of his career. The five-time world champion has been unable to reproduce his practice form on stage, and at the Swiss Darts Trophy, another golden opportunity to secure an important result slipped away. On the Darts Draait Door podcast, Damian Vlottes and Vincent van der Voort voiced their concerns about the Dutch darts legend.
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On paper, Van Barneveld had a winnable first-round match in Basel, but he went down 6-3 to Mike Kuivenhoven. Kuivenhoven is enjoying an excellent season, but Van der Voort is more concerned by the manner of Van Barneveld’s defeat.
“When you see the way he loses, it’s simply not good,” Van der Voort said. “Kuivenhoven was actually kind to let it finish 6-3.”
The former UK Open finalist said it was a painful observation, especially when comparing the current Van Barneveld with the player who spent years among the world’s elite. “If you’d said years ago that Van Barneveld was coming on stage, followed by Kuivenhoven... All respect to Mike, because he’s having a fantastic year, but with Raymond you used to know he wouldn’t lose that match.”
That sense of certainty seems to have disappeared. In the past, Van Barneveld could put opponents under pressure through his presence and experience alone. “He would also walk on stage with a ‘win at all costs’ mentality,” Van der Voort said. “He doesn’t have that anymore.”
Van Barneveld is searching for his feel on stage
Van der Voort recently spoke to Van Barneveld and believes he has identified a key part of the problem. The 59-year-old from The Hague is not performing badly in practice or during his warm-up. The issue begins when he steps onto the match stage.
“He expects to throw the same way he does in his warm-up,” Van der Voort explained. “So you step on stage and it doesn’t happen straight away. Then you can do one of two things. You can think, ‘How can this be? What’s going on now?’ and your throw gets even weaker. That’s what he does. Or you can simply think, ‘I need to put more power into my throw.’”
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Van der Voort believes Van Barneveld needs to fight his way into the match much more assertively at such moments. “He needs to play with more authority. He needs to make his presence felt. You can hit as many 180s as you like in your warm-up.”
Vlottes and Van der Voort therefore suggested that Van Barneveld might make more use of the option to practise on stage before a tournament. That can mean changing his preparation. If a player is not due to play until late in the evening, for example, he may have to travel to the venue several hours earlier.
“Maybe you do need to do that,” Van der Voort said. “You could go back to your hotel afterwards, or have a throw the day before. You need to get a feel for it.”
Van Barneveld is still not assured of a place at the World Championship.
“A warm-up room feels very different from the stage”
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Van der Voort knows from experience how different a warm-up room can feel from the stage itself. To television viewers, the distance to the board may look the same everywhere—and officially, of course, it is—but the surroundings can completely change a player’s perception.
“People don’t realise that a warm-up room feels very different from the stage,” Van der Voort said. “When you walk on stage in a large, high-ceilinged hall, the board seems far away. It can even look as if it’s hanging high up. There might be carpet that you sink into. It feels different.”
He pointed to his experiences in the Premier League. Players sometimes prepare in a relatively small room before stepping out into an arena filled with thousands of spectators.
“I’ve seen it in the Premier League. You’re in a small room with the players, with two boards set up, and you’re throwing together. Then you go into an arena with 10,000 people. In that little room, everything can seem very close. Then you walk on stage and suddenly the board seems far away.”
That change of setting can throw a player off his rhythm. “The first thing you think is, ‘Oh no, I can’t feel it anymore,’ even though you’d been feeling good the whole time.”
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Some players try to recreate that effect deliberately. Van der Voort cited Jelle Klaasen and Mervyn King as examples of players who sometimes stood a little further from the board during their warm-up. “In a room like that, everything seems closer and more compact. So you stand a little further back. But you have to be able to handle that yourself.”
Van der Voort recognised the feeling from his own career. “I’ve stood on a stage and thought, ‘Oh no, that looks a long way away.’ Then you feel as though you’ve been throwing from the wrong distance the whole time. You just hope that, at some point, you find your feel.”
That seems to be exactly Van Barneveld’s problem at the moment. “Apparently, his practice throws are going very well,” Van der Voort says. “Then he walks on stage and it just doesn’t happen. But he immediately expects the same thing to happen again. He has to let that go.”
“It’s still painful to watch”
Van Barneveld’s problems have come at a particularly bad time. His place in the race to qualify for the World Championship is under threat. That makes matches against players he should be able to beat on experience alone all the more important.
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“It’s still painful to watch,” Van der Voort sighs. “I think it’s painful for anyone who has been following darts for a long time. You don’t want to see this from such a great player.”
Van Barneveld is hovering around the cut-off for direct World Championship qualification. The recent tournaments could have earned him valuable prize money at just the right time. “It had to happen in Belgium and here,” Van der Voort says. “If you draw Jim Long and Kuivenhoven and are beaten fairly comfortably by both, that is worrying.”
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Van der Voort finds it at least somewhat understandable that Van Barneveld has become more vulnerable on the floor. Older players often struggle more with the demands of long ProTour days, when they have to get up early and perform almost straight away. On stage, however, Van Barneveld should have the advantage. “You get older. You have to get up early and head straight to the venue. That gets a little harder. But the stage should be his territory.”
His vast experience is another factor. Van Barneveld has played countless matches on the biggest stages in the world. Against someone like Kuivenhoven, that would normally be a decisive advantage.
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“I think he has three hundred times more stage experience than Kuivenhoven,” Van der Voort says. But, in his view, that advantage has disappeared. “He has lost that entire advantage. It’s still hard to watch.”
Samuel GillChief Content Officer
Samuel Gill is the Chief Content Officer (CCO) of DartsNews.com, a role he has held since 2020. He is responsible for editorial governance across the platform, including setting content standards, overseeing accuracy and consistency, and guiding long-term editorial strategy across professional darts coverage. Since joining, he has contributed more than 10,000 articles and editorial pieces, playing a central role in the development and daily operation of the site.
Based in Leicester, Samuel has extensive experience in darts media and has been closely involved in coverage of the professional darts circuit for several years. Within the UK darts community, he is a recognised figure known for his consistent editorial output and ongoing reporting on major tournaments and developments across the PDC calendar.
In his current role, Samuel works closely with editors and writers to ensure content meets clear journalistic standards, with a focus on source verification, editorial consistency, and timely updates when new, confirmed information becomes available.
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