THE WORLD 2016 GRAND FINAL was held in Hong Kong on Sun Dec 4. The long-awaited tournament had 16 leading players who were the top 8 of the 2016 ranking including its no.1 Paul Lim, the 7 winners of WILD CARD TOURNAMENT that was on Fri Dec 2 and the winner of PREMIUM STAGE, Keita Ono. These outstanding players made the GRAND FINAL this year much tougher than the previous one of 3 years ago.
The opening match was between Mitsumasa Hoshino and Keita Ono. They are in a mentoring relationship. These 2 Japanese players engaged in a heated match till the last leg and Hoshino advanced to the next round.
Many exciting matches followed but the most shocking match was the one that Randy Van Deursen of US defeated the top player of the 2016 ranking, Paul Lim. The Singaporean player was one of the strongest contenders of the title of GRAND FINAL. Lim threw first and took the first leg but Van Deursen dominated the game after the 2nd leg. Thus, the 2016 top disappeared from GRAND FINAL after his first match.
Van Deursen obtained his berth in WILD CARD TOURNAMENT. Among the 7 winners of WILD CARD TOURNAMENT, only Adrian Marcelino of the Philippines and Van Deursen won their first match. Then, they competed against Park Hyunchul and Boris Krcmar in the quarterfinal matches.
Park took the 2nd position in the opener in both THE WORLD 2015 and 2016. The Korean player performs brilliantly in critical phases of competitions. He presented his strength fully in front of the audience in GRAND FINAL. Park beat Scott Kirchner, the winner of SUPER DARTS 2013 in the first match and carried forward the momentum to quarterfinal and whitewashed Marcelino.
Park's opponent in semifinal is Leonard Gates who fascinated his audience with his astonishing performance in 2015. Gates took the 1st and 2nd legs but Park fought back and got 3rd to 5th legs. Thus, the Korean player advanced to final.
Krcmar is known as one of the world's strongest players although he had to give in to Lim in the 2016 ranking due to less no. of wins. The Croatian player beat Harith Lim of Singapore 3-1 in the first match and whitewashed Van Deursen who beat Paul Lim in their 1st match. In semifinal, Krcmar defeated Sho Katsumi who is the only Japanese player who has won 2 stages in THE WORLD. The Croatian player threw 1st in the 1st leg and took all 3 legs without giving Katsumi any opportunity to fight back. Krcmar had lost only 1 leg till final. He was giving all to get the position of the strongest of the world that he missed in the regular season.
Park and Krcmar competed in final of THE WORLD 2016 GRAND FINAL. Prior to the match, they had competed once during the 2016 season and Krcmar obtained the victory. So for Park, it is time to turn the defeat into a victory and to be named as the top of the world for the first time.
In the final match, Krcmar threw first and took the 1st leg with ease. The 2nd leg also went to the Croatian player as the Korean player lacked precision in his throws. However, Park got cricket in the 3rd with his amazing stats of 8.25MPR. The 2 players' exchange of 9 marks thrilled the audiences and showed them the world-class darts technique.
Park was leading in the 4th leg till the 7th round with 84 points where he hit single 17 twice and failed to hit 50. The dart went to single 2. Thus, Krcmar won THE WORLD 2016 GRAND FINAL finishing his 114 points.
Paul Lim shined as the 2017 ranking leader while Boris Krcmar was named as the world's strongest in GRAND FINAL. Fans will keep following the top 2 players in 2017. We are also looking forward to see the performances of the runner-up, Park, following Gates and Katsumi in the next year.
THE WORLD 2017 opener will be in Las Vegas, USA on Sat May 13. We can't wait to experience THE WORLD 2017.
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