Michael Smith knocked out the defending champion and No 1 seed, Gerwyn Price, in a thriller to reach the semi-finals of the PDC world championship at Alexandra Palace.
Smith, the runner-up to Michael van Gerwen in 2019, has the chance of another final appearance and will face James Wade in the semi-finals after his 5-4 victory over Price. The Welshman threw a nine-darter early on but he missed two match darts at the end of the eighth set, lost the next leg with the throw, and could not recover.
Peter Wright came through another close-fought quarter-final, defeating Callan Rydz by the same score. Wright will face Gary Anderson next – in a clash of two 51-year-old Scots – after fighting back from 3-1 down.
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Wade reached his first PDC world championship semi-final in nine years with a 5-0 win over Mervyn King, while the two-times world champion Anderson was forced to battle before coming past Luke Humphries with a 5-2 victory.
Wade, the No 4 seed, has not made the last four since 2013 but had too much for King, who had also rolled back the clock in this tournament, reaching the quarter-finals for the first time since 2009.
In the day’s second quarter-final Anderson, world champion in 2015 and 2016 and a finalist last year, lost the opening set and was pegged back at 2-2 before reeling off three sets on the spin to secure a semi-final spot.
