Chris Dobey produced a scintillating day of darts in Wigan, as he raced to his ninth Players Championship title with victory against Stephen Bunting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dobey – a winner of three Players Championship titles last year – claimed his first PDC ranking title of 2026, as he beat Bunting 8-1 to claim the \u00a315,000 top prize.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 35-year-old raced into a five-leg lead in the final, winning four out of the five legs in five visits or less, leaving Bunting with some serious work to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The St Helens star then claimed a consolation leg of his own in 14 darts, before Dobey rattled off the final three legs, with the last two legs being won in 26 darts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I felt like I played pretty steady all day, and I’m happy to get over the line,”\u00a0stated Dobey, who averaged 11 points higher than Bunting in the final.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Stephen said he felt good before the game, but sometimes it just isn’t your day, and fortunately for me, I came out on the winning end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“You need luck to win tournaments like this, I was defending this one from two years ago, and on Day One I won it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I want to be back in there [Premier League]. I didn’t do enough last year; I want to produce this game on the big stages.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having kicked off his campaign with a comfortable opening 6-1 victory against Shane McGuirk, he then beat Jimmy van Schie and Ryan Joyce 6-4 respectively, with Dobey averaging 106 against Joyce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Englishman then overcame former World Youth Champion Bradley Brooks, before denying Darryl Pilgrim in a last-leg thriller to book his place in the semi-finals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This set up a clash against Tom Bissell, and the Bedlington-born star dispatched Bissell, dropping only two legs in a convincing 7-2 victory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bunting, meanwhile, registered three ton-plus averages en route to the final, registering an average north of 105 in a 6-3 win over Alexander Merkx earlier in the day, after beating Carl Sneyd 6-1 in his opening game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 40-year-old then won a last-leg decider against Derek Coulson to book his place in the last 16, before seeing off Danny Noppert, Clayton, and James Wade before coming up short against Dobey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bissell dumped out TV title winners Ritchie Edhouse and Rob Cross on his way to the semi-final, whilst PC1 winner Wade beat the likes of Cristo Reyes and Kevin Doets before succumbing at the same stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bissell and Wade were joined in the quarter-finals by former Premier League champion Clayton, along with Doets, Pilgrim and Canadian Jim Long to complete the eight-player line-up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Doets posted three consecutive ton-plus averages on his way to the quarter-finals, beating Owen Bates with an average upwards of 113 in the Last 64.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Long also enjoyed some success in Wigan, beating Premier League star Josh Rock in one of his best performances of the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pilgrim – who had only won one game before today in 2026 – took the scalps of Maik Kuivenhoven, Gian van Veen, Ricardo Pietreckzko and Krzysztof Ratajski before losing to the eventual champion. Semi-Finals<\/strong> Final<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Chris Dobey 8-1 Stephen Bunting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Chris Dobey produced a scintillating day of darts in Wigan, as he raced to his ninth Players Championship<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9596,"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-9595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-darts"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t
RESULTS
Last 16
<\/strong>Tom Bissell 6-5 Ritchie Edhouse
Jim Long 6-2 Karel Sedlacek
Chris Dobey 6-0 Bradley Brooks
Darryl Pilgrim 6-5 Krzysztof Ratajski
Stephen Bunting 6-4 Danny Noppert
Jonny Clayton 6-5 Beau Greaves
Kevin Doets 6-3 Niko Springer
James Wade 6-5 Cristo Reyes
Quarter-Finals
<\/strong>Tom Bissell 6-4 Jim Long
Chris Dobey 6-5 Darryl Pilgrim
Stephen Bunting 6-3 Jonny Clayton
James Wade 6-4 Kevin Doets<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Chris Dobey 7-2 Tom Bissell
Stephen Bunting 7-6 James Wade<\/p>\n\n\n\n