Winning start for Price at PDC World Championship

Gerwyn Price began his bid for a second PDC world title with a convincing straight-set victory over Adam Gawlas.

Price, 40, lost only two of the 11 legs that were played, averaged 96.44 and hit six 180s in a dominant first-round display.

Czech thrower Gawlas, a former UK Open semi-finalist, was heavily outscored by Price throughout and was restricted to just three darts at doubles in the entire contest.

Five years on from his world title win, Welshman Price is among the favourites to lift the trophy again this time around, at the end of a consistent year in which he has had several deep runs in majors.

“I played pretty decent apart from the two legs I gave away,” the ninth seed, who enjoyed good support from the Alexandra Palace crowd, told Sky Sports.

Sixth seed Danny Noppert also made it through to round two with a 3-1 win against fellow Dutchman Jurjen van der Velde, who tried to combat the Alexandra Palace wasps by using bug spray on stage before the match.

Noppert will next play another debutant, England’s Justin Hood, who averaged 99.59 in a straight-set win over Nick Kenny of Wales during the afternoon session.

Chris Dobey’s 3-1 win against China’s Xiaochen Zong meant all three seeds in action on Tuesday progressed to the last 64.

In the day’s opening match, Scotland’s Alan Soutar missed 15 match darts before finally defeating Finnish debutant Teemu Harju in a sudden-death leg.

In an epic that lasted almost an hour and a half, 33-year-old Harju missed four match darts of his own in the sixth leg of the deciding set.

Soutar, 47, had flown into a two-set lead without losing a leg, averaging 107.36 at that stage and hitting six of his first eight attempts at doubles.

But while Harju maintained a steady level, Soutar’s overall three-dart average dropped closer to 90 and when opportunities arose, he was unable to put the match away.

Harju had the advantage of throwing first in the 11th and deciding leg of the fifth set at Alexandra Palace, but Soutar broke to win – landing his first dart at double 16 to complete a 45 checkout.

The record number of missed match darts in a major match is 18, by three-time world champion John Part.

Part was wearing glasses on stage for the first time and missed a succession of doubles in a defeat by Andy Hamilton in their Players Championship Finals contest in Minehead in 2013.

Soutar will face European Championship winner and 10th seed Gian van Veen of the Netherlands in round two.

England’s Scott Williams, a semi-finalist at Alexandra Palace in 2024, hit nine of his 14 attempts at doubles in a fine display of finishing as he beat Paolo Nebrida of the Philippines 3-0.

There is no afternoon session on Wednesday, meaning play will get under way at 19:00 GMT with four first-round ties scheduled.

From 19:00 GMT: