WDF World Masters Round-Up | Leonard Gates, Jimmy van Schie and Jeff Smith through as Deta Hedman leads the way for Ladies
WDFThursday, 30 October 2025 at 14:00
The knockout stages of the 2025 WDF World Masters are set with the draw confirmed with the Last 128 moving down to just a final four later today in both the men's and the women's tournaments.
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Among the group winners who moved through automatically to the knockout stages included multiple familiar faces including the top player in the WDF system at present in Jimmy van Schie as well as Leonard Gates who managed to move through their groups on Wednesday.
David Pallett also a name from yesteryear managed to top his group with three wins from three and back-to-back averages of 98.56. While others to win through included Jeff Springer Jr. of the USA as well as Jason Hogg who started with successive 95+ averages followed up by a 101.36 average against Vince Tipple.
Other victors included Jenson Walker, Corne Groeneveld, James Beeton, Krzysztof Kciuk, Benjamin Pratnemer, Liam Maendl-Lawrance and Jeff Smith who all booked their spots in the Last 128 of the Open tournament which is due to be played this afternoon in Hungary.
Van Schie faces Gino Florian in the Last 128, Gates will take on Jeroen Caron. Pallett faces Wojciech Brulinski as Jeff Smith faces Callum Francis with both the victors of the group as well as the player who finished runner-up qualifying through to the latter stages.
Hedman stands out, Suzuki out
Onto the Women's tournament and it was Deta Hedman as ever who stood out with 'The Heart of Darts' easing through her opening three games qualifying from her group going three out of three. She averaged 75.20 over her three games compared to the second place finisher Tabea Branka who averaged just over 50.
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Other well known faces to go flawless so far included Priscilla Steenbergen as well as Irina Armstrong who had to play four games. Due to the amount of players not being even some groups were formed of four players and others of five meaning some had to play four games to get through. Kirsi Viinikainen who has stood out on the Women's Series at times and made her Blackpool debut earlier this year won four from four in her group averaging 73 and looking superb in doing so.
Hedman flawless so far.
Rhian O'Sullivan who in the absence of Beau Greaves is perhaps the favourite on paper got through her opener and won 16 legs from her four games but only averaged 60 over the course of the group stage. Albeit that is perhaps an anomaly given that she faced players mostly averaging in the 30's and 40's throughout the groups.
Mikuru Suzuki perhaps was the surprising name not to make it through in a highly competitive group as she lost out on leg difference with Louise Paterson and Lee Tsz Ching going through instead. Lerena Rietbergen, Aurora Fochesato and Paula Jacklin all made it through finally and the tournament will be played down towards a conclusion today.
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