Dave Chisnall suffered an embarrassing miscount during his PDC World Darts Championship second round match to Ricky Evans on Monday night as he joins a number of other ranked players exiting early
Dave Chisnall’s World Darts Championship dreams were dashed in a cringe-worthy blunder on Monday night (December 23), as he celebrated a leg win prematurely. He then went on to realise he’d left eight on the board. To make the situation worse, the 13th seed was sent packing from Alexandra Palace after a nail-biting 3-2 defeat to Ricky Evans.
In a moment of high drama, Chizzy thought he’d clinched a 131 finish with a triple 19, triple 14 and double 16, and even threw his hands up in triumph. But the celebration was cut short when he discovered his actual requirement was D20, not D16, leaving him red-faced.
Sky Sports’ Glen Durrant was gobsmacked: “Can we get any more drama than this? A miscount at the most important time! ” and “Chisnall doesn’t know what day it is. What a match this is and it deserves to go the distance!”
Despite the gaffe, Chisnall managed to take the leg eventually on a double eight, but his luck ran out in the sudden death leg.
Evans, ranked world No. 45, nailed a D20 on his first go, wrapping up an epic showdown. Post-match, Sky Sports’ Dan Dawson summed it up: “A ridiculous miscount from Chizzy. That’s a blinding 131 finish – shame it’s not what he wanted! ” Meanwhile, Evans was over the moon with the raucous support from the Ally Pally fans.
In a hilarious post-match interview with Sky Sports, he said: “I played a world class player, I actually played well for once – normally it’s poo, normally it’s boring.”, reports the Express.
He continued, “Look at this, I’m a weird Kettering lad, I don’t understand it, why are they cheering me on? I wished I’d have beat Chizzy 3-0 because my ticker would have been a bit better.”
He then questioned, “What am I doing the other 11 months of the year? I don’t get this treatment in my household, I don’t understand it! They kept getting louder and louder, what are they cheering me for? ” He expressed his gratitude by saying, “Thank you for that everyone, you’ve made a fat lad very happy.”
Evans concluded by addressing the crowd directly, “Merry Christmas you weirdos! “.
Chisnall became a record-equalling thirteen of 31 seeds to have played and been knocked out before Christmas at the 2025 World Championship. Rob Cross was the 32nd and final seed to play, facing Scott Williams in the final match on Monday night and also succumbed to a 3-1 loss. Meaning fourteen ranked players have exited before the Christmas break.
However, Chizzy and Cross are not the highest seed to have crashed out, with second seed and 2023 world champion Michael Smith going down 3-2 to Kevin Doets in London last week.