Wade back in winner’s circle!

He hadn’t picked a dart up for nearly a month but it’s back to business for James Wade!

The Unicorn star claimed a 4th ranking title of the year with an 8-5 Players Championship victory over Portugal’s Jose de Sousa in Wigan.

The win moves Wade to the top of the Players Championship Order of Merit.

In the final, ‘The Machine’ punished his opponent for missed doubles despite being 10 points behind in the averages. An 86 finish to break throw and lead 5-4 was the key moment in the final and Wade was clinical as he completed a convincing win.

After victories over the Dutch duo of Benito van de Pas and Yordi Meeuwisse, he won a last leg decider to beat fellow Unicorn star Keegan Brown.

And after a win over Rowby-John Rodriguez, Wade hit ton plus averages to beat Unicorn youngster Callan Rydz and Saturday’s winner Krzysztof Ratajski in the quarter and semi-finals.

It was a dream day for Rydz who only found out late on that he was in the tournament. An early train back to Wigan saw him rewarded with his best display in a PC event. En route to the last eight, he averaged 103 to see off Steve Beaton and 101 in beating Brendan Dolan.

And a memorable weekend for Dimitri van den Bergh and Madars Razma who both hit magical 9 darters on the tour! Dimitri lost 7-5 to De Sousa in Sunday’s semi-finals.

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Meanwhile Team Unicorn enjoyed a successful Euro Tour qualifying stint at the weekend. Chris Dobey, Keegan Brown and Ted Evetts have won through to both the Czech Darts Open this month and the Austrian Darts Championship in August.

Devon Petersen and Madars Razma qualified for the first ever Czech Euro Tour event, while Cameron Menzies, Kyle Anderson, Dimitri van den Bergh and Jeffrey de Zwaan all made it to the tournament in Austria.

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Unicorn Japanese ace Seigo Asada remains in second spot on the PDC Asian Tour after the latest weekend of action in Taipei as he closes in on a spot at the World Championship.

Asada got through to the semi-finals of Asian Tour 8, where he lost to eventual winner Lourence Ilagen......Ilagen beat Noel Malicdem in both finals and also hit a 9 darter!

And there was good news for Unicorn new boy Toru Suzuki who claimed a quarter-final place before losing to veteran Paul Lim.

By STUART PYKE