King dumps out Aspinall in opening tie of 2019 World Matchplay

Aspinall was fancied by many as an outside tip for the title; but struggled on doubles at times on debut and King's experience showed as he reeled off six consecutive legs to defeat the UK Open Champion 10-5 with a 100 average and seven 180's.

To begin the contest, King was dominant in the early going smashing his way into a 3-0 lead in the early going; with a 104 checkout and an 85 on the bullseye giving him the early advantage.

Aspinall claimed a leg back; but King went into the interval 4-1 up to ask the question of the Stockport ace. He answered them by breaking the throw with a first maximum and D16 to go 4-2 behind.

He held throw with a 127 checkout to go within one and completely turned the tide by making it parity at 4-4. King looked to be struggling with the heat on the Winter Gardens stage; as a result Aspinall held his throw to turn it round to his experienced opponent to come back into it.

At the second break, it went in though at 5-5 and when they came back out King regained the upperhand. This was capped off with a brilliant 160 checkout to break throw and as Aspinall started to miss more and more darts, the Bradwell ace showed poise to go 8-5 up to break again.

From there, King finished the job off by holding and then breaking throw once again to win the match and dump out Aspinall in the process.

Click here for more information on this year's World Matchplay.

First Round
Nathan Aspinall (102.96) 5-10 (100.55) Mervyn King
20:10 Gerwyn Price v Stephen Bunting
21:10 Gary Anderson v Danny Noppert
22:10 Rob Cross v Chris Dobey

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