Gerwyn Price produced a magnificent 170 checkout to light up the opening day of the Riyadh Season Saudi Arabia Darts Masters, as Man Lok Leung created history with victory over Danny Noppert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The inaugural staging of the Saudi Arabia Darts Masters got underway at the Global Theater on Monday, and Price was one of the evening’s stand-out performers in Riyadh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Welshman dominated from start to finish against PDC Asian Tour winner Alexis Toylo, averaging over 100 and landing a spectacular 170 checkout to complete a whitewash win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It was a slow start, but after the 170 finish, I felt like I was starting to find my feet,”\u00a0claimed Price, who pinned six of his ten attempts at double.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I want to hit the ground running at the beginning of the season and win here for the first time, and I’m definitely after that nine-darter as well!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Price will go head-to-head with Luke Humphries in a tantalising quarter-final tussle, after the world number two made a sprint for the finish to wrap up a 6-2 win over Japan’s Ryusei Azemoto.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It’s mixed emotions for me. I struggled getting that first dart in the right place, but it’s a decent start,”\u00a0asserted Humphries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Everybody wants to be the first player to win this title. It’s an exciting tournament and hopefully I can be the first player to put my name on it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, the big story on Day One saw Lok Leung stun former UK Open champion Noppert to become the first player to triumph on a PDC stage in Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lok Leung- aided by an 11-darter in the opening leg – raced into an early 3-0 lead, before wrapping up a 6-3 success to set up a quarter-final clash against Nathan Aspinall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I am very happy to play my game on the stage,” reflected Lok Leung, who steered Hong Kong to last year’s World Cup quarter-finals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It is my first win in the first match [in Saudi Arabia], so this is a big win for me.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Aspinall, meanwhile, eased through to the quarter-finals with an emphatic 6-1 success against PDC Asian Champion Lourence Ilagan, averaging 100.93 in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Monday’s action also saw Michael van Gerwen begin his bid for back-to-back World Series of Darts titles with a comprehensive 6-1 victory over Indian trailblazer Nitin Kumar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The three-time World Champion prevailed in Bahrain on Friday, and he continued his winning run at the Global Theater, converting 74, 92 and 102 finishes to cap off a clinical display.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Stephen Bunting also advanced by the same scoreline, dispatching two-time World Championship qualifier Tomoya Goto to set up a last eight showdown against the Dutch superstar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Elsewhere, Luke Littler and Gian van Veen overcame Paul Lim and Motomu Sakai respectively to set up a fascinating quarter-final clash, in a repeat of the World Championship final earlier this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Littler \u2013 pitted against Singapore’s darting icon Lim for the second successive World Series event \u2013 defeated the 71-year-old 6-1 in Bahrain, before repeating the feat in Riyadh to open his title bid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“This is all new to us players, but I felt good up there tonight,”\u00a0said Littler, who is setting his sights on a fifth World Series of Darts title on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It\u00a0would mean everything to win the first event over here. There can only be one winner, and hopefully I can do it tomorrow.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Van Veen \u2013 runner-up to Van Gerwen in Bahrain on Friday \u2013 defied a mid-game rally from Sakai to seal a dominant 6-2 win, reeling off three consecutive legs to maintain his impressive form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The quarter-finals, semi-finals and final will take place on a bumper Finals Day in Riyadh on Tuesday, as the remaining eight players compete for televised silverware in Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There will also be a bumper $100,000 prize on offer to any player who lands a nine-darter tomorrow – and this bonus could be doubled following the introduction of the\u00a0Riyadh Season Bullseye.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If a nine-darter is hit during the event, the player will be given\u00a0one dart at the bullseye to double their prize to $200,000, which would constitute the biggest prize pot for a nine-darter in PDC history. Round One<\/strong>: Man Lok Leung 6-3 Danny Noppert; Stephen Bunting 6-1 Tomoya Goto; Nathan Aspinall 6-1 Lourence Ilagan; Michael van Gerwen 6-1 Nitin Kumar; Luke Littler 6-1 Paul Lim; Gerwyn Price 6-0 Alexis Toylo; Luke Humphries 6-2 Ryusei Azemoto; Gian van Veen 6-2 Motomu Sakai<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gerwyn Price produced a magnificent 170 checkout to light up the opening day of the Riyadh Season Saudi<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8185,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-8184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-darts"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed.jpg",2000,1259,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-300x189.jpg",300,189,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-768x483.jpg",640,403,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-1024x645.jpg",640,403,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-1536x967.jpg",1536,967,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed.jpg",2000,1259,false],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-825x575.jpg",825,575,true],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed-590x410.jpg",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Newsbeat<\/a>","tag_info":"Newsbeat","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2026SDMR1_LokLeungNoppert1_compressed.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8184"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8184\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8186,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8184\/revisions\/8186"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
RESULTS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n