Germany's Gabriel Clemens has continued his run at the PDC World Championship by thrashing top seed Gerwyn Price by a 5-1 scoreline in the quarter-finals.
Clemens had already become the first player from his country to reach the last eight before he produced arguably the performance of his career to dismantle Price.
Although the Welshman averaged in excess of 107 to take the opening set, he could not match Clemens's consistency, and constant jeering from the Alexandra Palace led to Price bizarrely returning from one of the breaks wearing headphones.
While he immediately hit a 12-darter, Clemens took the next six legs without reply, setting up a semi-final with Michael Smith.
The Silence of the Fans... 🎧 pic.twitter.com/zkXmTYuqBx
— PDC Darts (@OfficialPDC) January 1, 2023
The recently-crowned Grand Slam of Darts champion was relatively out of sorts during the opening two sets of his clash with Stephen Bunting, but a mid-match surge of three successive sets moved him to within one of victory.
Bunting rallied in sets six and seven as Smith's level dropped off yet again, but the two-time runner-up was eventually able to post a 5-3 win, despite averaging six points fewer than Bunting.
In the other semi-final, Michael van Gerwen will square off against Dimitri van den Bergh after they defeated Chris Dobey and Jonny Clayton respectively.
Van Gerwen dropped just three legs as he thrashed Dobey 5-0, the Dutchman averaging exactly 102 as he took advantage of a below-par outing from his 22nd seed opponent.
Meanwhile, Van den Bergh and Clayton became embroiled in a back-and-forth thriller before the former eventually came through with a 5-3 success.
Clayton led on three separate occasions, being immediately pegged back each time, but doubles deserted him in the closing stages, allowing his Belgian opponent to reach the last four for the first time in his career.
Darren Plant
