WDF World Championship 2025 Round-Up | Matt Clark returns 22 years on at Lakeside in winning effort as World Master Lorraine Hyde survives 13 match darts

'Superman' Matt Clark 22 years on from his last appearance at Lakeside returned with a win at the WDF World Championship in one of the highlights on Tuesday evening in Frimley Green.

Clark also known as 'Superman' has been playing since 1988 and at 57 years old is an elder statesman of the game but one that has still managed to appear now and again at the highest level either in the BDO, PDC and now the WDF. He is seventh seed this week and the former World Matchplay Quarter-Finalist hasn't played at any World Championship since 2014 where he lost to Vincent van der Voort.

But in terms of Lakeside, it's even further back. He lost in the first round to a certain Raymond van Barneveld back in 2003. Best being his first year in which he reached the Quarter-Finals all the way back in 1996 losing to Les Wallace.

He was facing Haruki Muramatsu who of course himself is a veteran of the World stage by this point and he came from a set down to win 3-1. He took the opening set pinning 25 after Clark had missed a dart at the bull for the set. But Clark immediately hit back easing through the second set 3-0. But it was another comeback effort from Clark as he had to come from 2-0 down and survived set darts from Muramatsu to win through and go to the brink. This scare proved vital as he hit 113 to lead the final set in the end and swept it from there.

In the ladies tournament, it was World Master Lorraine Hyde and Priscilla Steenbergen who moved through joining Lerena Rietbergen and Maria Carli in the Quarter-Finals thus far.

Hyde returned to the Lakeside stage with new status this time as a World Master albeit admitted post match that Emine Dursun who she beat 2-1 was a player she had encountered and knew she would be in for a rough ride against. That was the case as she survived no less than 13 match darts to pass the test.

The Turkish ace had multiple chances to close it out at 2-0 before Hyde came back to win the deciding set and move through. She now faces Steenbergen who averaged 70 in taking down Tracy Feiertag.

Cruising past the American, the former Quarter-Finalist matches her best run to date and now returns on Friday to face Hyde.

To start the night, it was Benjamin Pratnemer who excelled with the methodical Slovenian winning through 3-0 against Daniel Bauerdick in his opener in Frimley Green.

Pratnemer in particular excelled on the scoring phase and could be a real danger this week given his ability to power score as well as frustrate players at tiems.

He took the opening set 3-1 producing back-to-back finishes of 89 and 83 to surge ahead. Albeit it wasn't a spark moment for Pratnemer that saw him take the second, it was merely just holding throw with the whole set going with the darts as he went 2-0 up in the race to three.

Albeit this also in the event of Pratnemer hitting double 10 saw a moment we have seen already this week with a player leaving the stage during a match for a toilet break. This time at the end of the set, Bauerdick left the room to go to the toilet. Albeit it didn't give him the thinking space he needed.

After losing the opening leg, Pratnemer surged to the win not losing another leg as he surges through. He now faces Sybren Gijbels who took down Marcus Maier.

Maier was a late replacement after David Pallett decided not to play and he looked good to start winning the first set but Gijbels eased through the next three from there to win 3-1 and book his spot in the Last 16.

Also through is his compatriot Francois Schweyen who now faces Matt Clark and came through a real testing tie as he faced off with Jeffrey Sparidaans and won through 3-2.

The Dutchman nearly won 3-1 but the former semi-finalist averted that. Sparidaans and Schweyen battled early with the Dutchman winning the opener 3-0 but the Belgian was back easing through the second 3-1. The third saw Sparidaans hit a 14 and 15 darter pinning superb two dart combos in 56 and 64 after power scoring efforts to go 2-0 up. He held to go 2-1 up in sets.

But Schweyen survived a match dart and levelled up the contest coming from behind to take the set 3-2. Sparidaans was on the verge again before Schweyen turned it around with a 13-darter to break and 16-darter to hold with Sparidaans waiting again. The former semi-finalist dodges a bullet but they are often the ones to dodge en route.