Female players will be guaranteed two places at the PDC World Darts Championship for the first time in the tournaments history after the Professional Darts Corporation announced radical changes to its flagship event with the tournament being expanded to 96 players.
The announcement of two female representatives comes after Momu Zhou became only the second female player after Anastasia Dobromyslova in 2010 to qualify for the World Cup of Darts tournament which took place in Frankfurt over the weekend. The PDC announced that two qualifiers will be held to fill in the places one UK qualifier and a Rest of the World qualifier with the winners entering the first round of the newly revamped competition.
PDC Chairman Barry Hearn told PDC.TV that it was “important to guarantee” female qualification for the first time in the tournaments 26 year history. Gayl King and Anastasia Dobromyslova are the only female players to feature at the PDC World Darts Championship. King became the first woman to compete in the tournament losing to Graeme Stoddart in the first round 3-1 in 2001. Whilst Dobromoslova played in the 2009 tournament losing out 5-3 to Dutchman Remco van Eijden in the Preliminary round of the competition.
The other key announcement is the expansion from a field of 72 to 96 meaning this years World Championship will be second biggest in size amongst the PDC majors behind the UK Open. The 32 seeds for the tournament will now gain a bye through to the second round of the competition with the top 32 players on the PDC Pro Tour order of merit who have not qualified for the tournament facing 32 players from various qualification tables and events from across the globe in the first round of the event.
Among these qualifiers will be the top 4 players on the newly established PDC Asian Tour, the top 2 players on both the PDC Development Tour Order of merit for players under 23 alongside the top 2 from the PDC Baltic order of merit alongside winners of various other qualification tables such as the PDC Challenge Tour and DPA Australian Tour.
The tournament will take place over an expanded 16 days at London’s iconic Alexandra Palace and will comprise of 28 sessions, the most in the tournaments history starting on Thursday December 13thand running through to New Years Day’s final.
Talking to PDC.TV Chairman of the PDC Barry Hearn stated that “The William Hill World Darts Championship has become a phenomenon in worldwide sport given its incredible growth in recent years, but this announcement takes the tournament to a whole new level,”
“The World Championship has grown year-on-year in the decade since our move from the Circus Tavern to Alexandra Palace, which is the perfect home for such a prestigious event.”
“Moving to 96 players will not only reward more players from our ProTour, with 32 qualifiers joining the world’s top 32 players in securing places in the World Championship, but also gives us the opportunity to expand the international qualifiers.”
In another announcement by the PDC they also announced a record prize fund for the Sports showpiece with a £2.5 million jackpot with a first prize of £500,000 again a record for a professional darts tournament. This was announced following tournament sponsor’s William Hill’s contract extension through to 2022.
The half a million-pound first prize eclipses Rob Cross’ £400,000 for beating Phil Taylor in the red ribbon event earlier this year and this announcement also comes into line with Hearn’s promise in 2015 that the tournament would have a £500,000 first prize by 2020.
The tournament will also be the first World Championships on Sky Sports since signing a 7 year extension to their contract with the Professional Darts Corporation to screen their major televised events.
Henry Deacon Media 