The dream is over for James Wade and Devon Petersen.
Wade missed FIVE match darts to beat Ryan Joyce and there was heartache for Devon Petersen who was edged out 4-3 in a tie-break by Nathan Aspinall.
The Unicorn duo will both feel they blew golden opportunities to reach the World Championship quarter-finals.
Wade led three sets to two against Joyce. He had hit a superb 81 on the bull to avoid going two sets down before hitting the front.
He will be hugely disappointed. In the sixth set he should have won the match comfortably. Wade missed two at ‘tops’ to win four sets to two. Joyce then blew three of his own for the set.
Back came Wade and incredibly he missed three more match darts, this time at D10 and D5. His opponent won the leg and sent the match into a deciding set.
Joyce broke the Wade throw and missed three match darts of his own. Wade needed 36 to send the game into a tie-break but missed again....three at D18 and Joyce hit D4 last dart in hand to cause another huge upset.
He will now play Michael van Gerwen in the quarter-finals. Wade is left to muse on what might have been, as is Devon Petersen.
Petersen will never forget the three darts at D12 he missed for a three-set lead. All three of them on the top wire. He’d raced through the opening two sets losing only one leg and hit six doubles from nine attempts.
But it all changed as the South African gave Aspinall a sniff. Those misses at D12 let his opponent in. It actually got worse. Petersen should have had another dart at ‘tops’ for the set. Needing 80, he hit single 20 but his aim was off and the second dart bounced into the first one and onto the floor. The opportunity was lost and Aspinall pinched the set.
It went all the way to that seventh and deciding set. Four holds of throw later and it was tie-break time. Aspinall held in the fifth leg and after Devon struggled to find big trebles, the youngster from Stockport cashed in t reach a World Championship quarter-final against Brendan Dolan.
3rd Round results:
Nathan Aspinall 4-3 Devon Petersen
Brendan Dolan 4-1 Benito van de Pas
Ryan Joyce 4-3 James Wade
STUART PYKE reporting from the World Championship
Images courtesy Lawrence Lustig / PDC
