England's duo of Michael Smith and Rob Cross are through as top seeds to the second round and a meeting with Lithuania after edging past Philippines' Lourence Ilagan and Noel Malicdem.
It was a tie which saw Smith and Cross have to contend with an excellent display from Ilagan but in the end, Malicdem didn't do enough to force them into a potential winning position.
Smith took an early break with a 66 checkout for a 1-0 lead for England. Cross hit double 10 to hold and go 2-0 up.
Malicdem kept the arrears down though with an 84 checkout to halve the deficit. Some quality darts from Malicdem and Ilagan saw them leave 81 but he couldn’t pin the bull.
Smith returned for a 61 checkout but missed double 20 and Ilagan returned for a 25 checkout but only gave himself one dart after drifting into 18. Cross pounced and hit double 10 for a hold of throw. Ilagan continued to impress with a relentless display of scoring and left Malicdem 32 which pinned to make it 3-2.
A 140 from Ilagan left 167 which Malicdem missed on the bull. ‘The Gunner’ pinned double 12 from a 25 checkout to claim a 14-dart break of throw and make it 3-3.
A 139 set up from Cross left 64 for Smith with Philippines on 132 after a poor visit from Malicdem. Smith couldn’t pin double 20 but Malicdem couldn’t hit 92 and this allowed Cross back for double 10 once more and a break back. A 174 and 32 saw Smith close out a 5-3 victory and move through.
Spain are also through concluding the afternoon session after producing a comeback to see off Italy in a deciding leg shootout.
The team of Toni Alcinas and Jesus Noguera were 3-1 down and were second best throughout against Andrea Micheletti and Daniele Petri but came back to edge through.
It was a slack first leg from both and Micheletti pinned double 12 to break throw. This confidence brought Italy a 140 to begin the leg as they looked to consolidate an early lead.
A 35 checkout saw Italy double their lead and this lead to a massive roar from Petri. He had a golden opportunity in going for a 97 checkout to break once more but his second and third dart were off the mark and Alcinas who was somewhat out of sorts up to this point pinned double 10 to halve the deficit.
Double nine made it 3-1 to Italy and Petri let out another roar. Alcinas hit a 140 to leave 81 which Noguera pinned for a 3-2 deficit.
Spain began to find their range and pinned a 118 checkout to make it 3-3 and break. It was a lead with a hold of throw and a 68 checkout as the match was suddenly turned on it’s head.
They missed a match dart of a 100 checkout and so it went to a decider. Once more they had trouble seeing out the match going all the way down to double one but they hit it first time to complete the comeback.
World Cup of Darts 2020 schedule
Friday 6 November
Afternoon session (12:00 GMT)
Lithuania (87.23) 5-3 (77.17) Gibraltar
Portugal (85.4) 5-0 (73.32) Hungary
New Zealand (86.22) 5-2 (72.85) Denmark
Northern Ireland (87.78) 2-5 (94.51) Canada
Belgium (93.53) 5-4 (90.37) Czech Republic
Austria (82.91) 5-2 (81.18) USA
England (90.32) 5-3 (89.48) Philippines
Italy (78.83) 4-5 (86.67) Spain
Place comments
0 Comments
You are currently seeing only the comments you are notified about, if you want to see all comments from this post, click the button below.
Show all comments