Preview Friday evening PDC World Darts Championship 2026: Blockbuster clash between Gurney and Greaves, Crowd favorite Aspinall also in action

They had to wait a bit, but now the World Darts Championship is finally about to start for the last eight players of the first round. The spotlight will be on the second match, widely billed as the tie of the opening round.

Before that, William O'Connor and Krzysztof Kciuk will first battle for a place in the second round. Then comes the marquee clash between Daryl Gurney and Beau Greaves. Nathan Aspinall will then face Lourence Ilagan, before Keane Barry and Tim Pusey fight it out to complete the second-round line-up.

After some low-key years on the Pro Tour, William O'Connor finally made his mark again this season. The Magpie, who claimed his only PDC title in 2019, reached a floor final and added three semi-finals and three quarter-finals on the Pro Tour. The Irishman is therefore in an excellent position to qualify for the World Matchplay and the World Grand Prix in 2026. O'Connor has never made the World Matchplay, while his last World Grand Prix appearance dates back to 2015. For the ninth consecutive year, the 39-year-old from Limerick features at the World Championship, where he reached the last 32 in the 2019 and 2022 editions.

His opponent Krzysztof Kciuk no longer holds a PDC Tour Card, but he does have some Pro Tour experience. He qualified for the World Championship by winning the Polish qualifier. The Thumb debuted at the 2010 World Championship at Ally Pally, but lost in the preliminary round to Haruki Muramatsu. He then had to wait fourteen years for his next Worlds appearance. That time also ended empty-handed, with a 3-0 defeat to Connor Scutt. Will it be third time lucky for the 45-year-old Pole?

This will be the third meeting between O'Connor and Kciuk. In 2022, O'Connor won their first encounter 6-5, and a year later the Irishman again edged it 6-5. Michael van Gerwen will watch this one with interest, as his next opponent will come from this match.

Fallon Sherrock still stands as the only woman ever to win a match at the World Championship, but the chances are greater than ever that Beau Greaves will join that list. What a year the 21-year-old Englishwoman has had. She won titles in men’s fields on the Challenge Tour and Development Tour, and is now unbeaten in 86 straight matches on the Women’s Series. On that circuit, Greaves won no fewer than eighteen of the 24 events. Beau 'n' Arrow also played the UK Open earlier this year, where she reached the fourth round and pushed then-world number one Luke Humphries hard. She also produced strong displays at the Grand Slam of Darts, and caused a sensation by beating Luke Littler in the World Youth Championship semi-finals. Averages over 90 are no longer unusual for the greatest female player of all time, and she regularly tops a ton as well. In this form, she could easily string together a few rounds at Ally Pally.

Daryl Gurney will surely have scratched his head at this draw, as Superchin is in for a battle. Even so, the Northern Irishman has had a fine season, winning the World Cup of Darts for Northern Ireland alongside Josh Rock. It was Gurney’s first TV title since 2018. Individually, he also impressed with two major quarter-finals and a Euro Tour semi-final. It lifted him back into the world’s top 24, a position Gurney is keen to keep to secure automatic entry to the World Masters in early 2026. For that, he needs a solid to strong World Championship, as the margins are very tight in this region of the rankings.

Nathan Aspinall has delivered a superb response after sliding to 23rd in the world rankings this summer. The Asp lost the prize money from his 2023 World Matchplay title on the ranking and dropped back significantly. He made up for that by winning three Euro Tour titles, and in the build-up to the Worlds the Stockport thrower showed form by reaching the final at the Players Championship Finals. It lifted Aspinall back to 15th on the PDC Order of Merit, though he will want to climb a few more spots to boost his Premier League Darts chances in 2026. Aspinall is a fans’ favorite and his popular walk-on helps, but a poor World Championship could still give the PDC a reason to leave The Asp out of the line-up for a year.

The draw paired the two-time major winner with Lourence Ilagan, the Filipino darter who is appearing at the PDC World Championship for the tenth time. “The Gunner” has, however, only once reached the second round in London. Ilagan also found it a bit tougher this year to secure his spot via the Asian Tour Order of Merit, the ranking on which he ultimately finished third. That was mainly because Ilagan managed to claim two titles during the penultimate block of the Asian Tour.

In the final match of the first round it is Keane Barry’s turn, and by reaching this tournament he has at least kept hold of his Tour Card for another year. The sting was in the tail for “Dynamite,” who only qualified for the last Euro Tour event of the season and, at the final Players Championship event of 2025, also reached his only quarterfinal. It will be his seventh World Championship appearance; Barry has passed the first round three times and saw his campaign end in the opening round three times.

Tim Pusey is one of four Australian entrants at the World Championship. He earned a World Championship ticket by winning the overall standings of the ADA Tour. For the 33-year-old, it will be the first time he steps onto the biggest stage in the sport. Pusey, however, mostly made headlines this year because of his unusual nickname “The Magnet,” a nod to his surname. Pusey recently revealed that the PDC had asked him to come up with a new nickname in the run-up to the World Championship.