World No 1 Luke Humphries dropped just two legs all day as he stormed into the quarter-finals of the UK Open, where a final versus Luke Littler remains a possibility.
Humphries had to rally from 7-5 down to beat women’s world No 1 Beau Greaves in the fourth round on Friday night but was ruthless on Saturday, sweeping good friend Ryan Searle 10-0 before trouncing Ryan Joyce 10-2 in a pair of statement performances.
‘Cool Hand’ – pipped 11-10 by Dimitri Van den Bergh in last year’s final – has won 25 of his last 27 legs in Minehead and appears the man to beat ahead of Sunday’s final day, where he will take on three-time UK Open champion James Wade in the last eight.
Reigning world champion Littler has been drawn against Gian van Veen after a dominant 10-4 victory over Jermaine Wattimena in the last 32 was followed by a hard-fought 10-8 success over Krzysztof Ratajski in the round of 16.
Littler led the Pole 6-2 but was then pegged back to 6-6 before Ratajski missed a dart at D20 to set up a last-leg shoot-out as a relieved ‘Nuke’ clinched victory on double two.
In the other quarter-finals, 2019 UK Open winner Nathan Aspinall will take on Josh Rock and 2023 world champion Michael Smith will meet Jonny Clayton.
Luke Littler was made to work by Krzysztof Ratajski before advancing through to the last eight
Michael van Gerwen was the biggest name to be dumped out on Saturday, falling in the fifth round to Rob Owen as he missed his first 15 attempts at a double and hit only eight of 34 overall as he saw his hopes of a fourth title in this event extinguished.
Defending champion Van den Bergh also suffered a shocker, trounced 10-3 by Smith in the last 16 after recording an average of 71 and a highest checkout of 40.
The main-stage action on Saturday night was rounded off by Rock’s 10-6 defeat of Rob Cross, with the Northern Irishman rallying from 4-0 down after winning 10 of the final 12 legs.
Van Veen saw off Damon Heta 10-9 on stage two after the latter had recovered from 9-6 down, while Wade defeated Van Gerwen’s conqueror Owen 10-8 on the same board.
UK Open – sixth-round results
- Luke Littler 10-8 Krzysztof Ratajski
- Jonny Clayton 10-4 Martin Schindler
- Nathan Aspinall 10-8 William O’Connor
- James Wade 10-8 Rob Owen
- Luke Humphries 10-2 Ryan Joyce
- Gian van Veen 10-9 Damon Heta
- Michael Smith 10-3 Dimitri Van den Bergh
- Josh Rock 10-6 Rob Cross
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