Arno Merk defeats two-time world champion Peter Wright

His purple hair shone in the light of the palace – but when Peter Wright stepped onto the big stage, a Christmas song played instead of the usual “Don’t stop the Party”. Wright’s regular musical warning probably wouldn’t have prevented his rather unknown opponent from crashing the Scottish pre-Christmas party this Tuesday evening.

The next surprise happened at the Darts World Championship in London. Peter Wright, twice title holder at Alexandra Palace, came under heavy pressure against the German Arno Merk. A solid performance was enough for the tapping technician from Upper Bavaria to win 3-0 against the Scot, who didn’t find his game from the first arrow and only won one so-called leg, Merk took nine.

“I’m still shaking a bit, my heart is still racing but I’m overjoyed,” said the 33-year-old on the Dazn microphone after his game. “Peter didn’t play his best game, but I was always there, played consistently and didn’t give him any opportunities to develop.” In the third round, Merk will face either Michael van Gerwen from the Netherlands or William O’Connor from Ireland, which in any case will be much more complicated than this evening.

Merk didn’t have any presents in her luggage for the Scot the day before Christmas. The Scot’s average values ​​also spoke for themselves: 79 points in the three-arrow game, the so-called checkout rate was 13 percent, all significantly weaker than during Wright’s heyday on this stage. Merk achieved an average of 92 points and a checkout rate of 47 percent. At his debut in London, he will be the fourth of eight German players to make it into the third round of the World Cup, which will be played after Christmas. Martin Schindler, Gabriel Clemens and Ricardo Pietreczko had previously reached the round of 32.