"You have to look away from just the top eight, 10 or 12 players": PDC expands once again - Matt Porter confirms brand-new major tournament for 2027
PDCTuesday, 21 July 2026 at 18:53
The PDC is further expanding the international darts calendar in 2027. Matt Porter has confirmed that a brand-new major tournament will be introduced in Central Europe next year. In addition, a new destination is planned for the European Tour, and the organisation is working on a new ticketing system for the World Darts Championship at Alexandra Palace.
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New major tournament aims to bring the calendar into better balance
Earlier this month, PDC Europe hinted that a new tournament series would be added in 2027. That event will be linked to the new PDC Europe Start, a qualifying series to be held next year in Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Switzerland.
“There will be another premier event that will be staged in central Europe next year,” Porter said to Weekly Dartscast.
“I think it’s really good in terms of wanting to balance out the calendar. A lot of the major ranking events are towards the second half of the year.
“The Premier League makes it quite difficult to schedule things earlier on in the year, but this one’s not that early in the year, but it is earlier than the majority of the other ones.
“I think that’s fair (to hold the new major early in the year). You have to look away from just the top eight, 10 or 12 players and say what are the opportunities that are there for the rest of the tour card holders. They need to have opportunities away from just the floor events.”
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New location likely for European Tour and Ally Pally ballot
Porter also confirmed that a new location will be added to the European Tour in 2027 off the back of events in Poland and Slovakia this year.
“We spoke to the promoter in Slovakia afterwards and he was very happy with how it went,” the PDC boss said.
“We’ve got another new one coming on (the calendar) for next year, which is exciting. We’ll just keep pushing it.”
Darts is going through a real boom period with Luke Littler of course anchoring it and this has led to ticketing becoming even more of an issue as fans miss out on the top events. Now the PDC will look to perhaps adopt a ballot system to help this.
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“We’re looking at mid to late August,” Porter said. “We want to get it right and get the message right.
“We’ve talked about ballot systems. We’re looking at that (a ballot) to increase the chance for more people to get tickets.
“It’s our aim that as many people as possible get to go to the event and, by increasing the capacity and changing the way tickets are distributed, we should be able to do that.”
More to be added after Slovak success.
They also adopted the system for the Grand Slam of Darts with that presumably being a test. “It’s quite difficult logistically,” Porter continued. “We want to reward our (PDC annual) members and make sure they get priority, but also we don’t want to close the door on people coming into the system.
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“There’s been a lot of work going on behind the scenes with our ticketing partners and our data warehouse partner.”
No plans to give Littler and co free pass into Minehead
Also amid all the conjecture that has surrounded it Matt Porter has confirmed that there are no plans to give Luke Littler and others a free pass into major tournaments if the cannot be bothered to play in the qualifiers.
For instance Littler has boycotted the ProTour this year and has not played any of them. He currently won't qualify for Minehead and conjecture surrounding it is that the PDC then misses out on having their leading lights in their entirety involved in this event. This in tune not being a good thing for the broadcaster.
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“Luke and the other 127 players know what the criteria is,” Porter said. "He’s absolutely within his rights not to play in ProTour events, with the demands on him from a time perspective, and I kind of don’t blame him.
“Maybe you’d say play in a couple of early ones (Players Championships) and win some money and get through to Minehead, but it’s up to the player. If he doesn’t want to play that’s absolutely fine and the other players will probably be happy about that!”
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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