Joe Cullen claimed his third European Tour title and a fourth tournament win of 2022 with a superb 8-2 defeat of William O’Connor in Sunday’s Hungarian Darts Trophy final.<\/p>\n
The PDC European Tour’s second visit to Budapest saw the BOK Sportcsarnok enjoy some sensational darts across three days of action.<\/p>\n
2022 Masters champion and Premier League runner-up Cullen scooped the \u00a325,000 top prize, claiming European Tour glory for a third time with his first win since the 2020 International Darts Open.<\/p>\n
Cullen had battled past Martin Lukeman in Saturday’s second round, and saw off Jim Williams in Sunday afternoon’s third round to continue his challenge.<\/p>\n
He then overcame Rusty-Jake Rodriguez 6-4 in the quarter-finals and survived three missed match darts from Dave Chisnall during their semi-final, before producing a 12-darter to complete a 7-6 victory.<\/p>\n
Cullen’s most dominant display came in the final, as he claimed the opening five legs without reply, twice punishing missed doubles from O’Connor whilst also posting a 13-dart leg, two 14-darters and a 100 finish.<\/p>\n
O’Connor hit back with double ten and then produced a 124 finish to break with a sparkling 12-darter, but five further missed doubles in the next leg allowed Cullen in to move 6-2 up.<\/p>\n
The World Series star then edged towards victory with an 11-darter as he took out 96, and four further misses from the former World Cup finalist allowed him to claim the title on double eight.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t expect to come to Budapest and win, but I’m over the moon,” said Cullen.<\/p>\n
“In my first three games I was terrible and a bit lucky to get through all three of them. Then I turned it on a little bit in the semis and I think I was pretty decent in the final.<\/p>\n
“I kept Willie at bay, because I’d seen how well he played over the weekend and that’s what I had to do.”<\/p>\n
O’Connor came from 5-3 down to edge out Michael Smith in Sunday afternoon’s third round, before defeating Jose de Sousa and Nathan Aspinall to reach his first European Tour final since 2018.<\/p>\n
“The fantastic crowd in Budapest is one of the best crowds I’ve ever seen,” said O’Connor. “If you told me before the weekend that I’d get to a final, I’d be absolutely ecstatic.<\/p>\n
“Although it’s a disaster to lose in any final – it’s not nice – I don’t mind losing to Joe. He’s one of the best guys in the game and I wish him the very best in the future.”<\/p>\n
Aspinall had won through to his third European Tour semi-final of 2022 following a dramatic ending to his last eight clash with Ryan Meikle, who missed the bullseye for a 170 checkout in the deciding leg.<\/p>\n
Chisnall’s run saw him reach a fifth ranking semi-final of the year with his best European Tour display, as he defeated Boris Krcmar with the aid of a 170 finish before whitewashing Josh Rock with a 102 average.<\/p>\n
Meikle’s 6-5 win over Simon Whitlock ensured his first quarter-final appearance of the year from his best run on the European Tour, as he agonisingly missed out on a last four place.<\/p>\n
Youngster Rodriguez was also appearing in his first European Tour quarter-final, after seeing off Madars Razma in the third round.<\/p>\n
Northern Irish youngster Rock averaged 100 in his third round win over Dirk van Duijvenbode, taking out 126 on the bull in the deciding leg to reach a second European Tour quarter-final in his debut year on the circuit.<\/p>\n
The PDC European Tour continues from September 9-11 with the Interwetten German Darts Open in Jena, as 48 players compete in the 11th of 13 events being held this year.<\/p>\n
The tournament will broadcast live on PDCTV, exclusively on DAZN in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, and through bookmakers’ websites worldwide.<\/p>\n
2022 Hungarian Darts Trophy Evening Session Semi-Finals<\/strong> Final<\/strong> Joe Cullen claimed his third European Tour title and a fourth tournament win of 2022 with a superb 8-2 defeat…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[109,124],"tags":[],"lang":"en","translations":{"de":4852,"en":4848},"pll_sync_post":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4848"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4848"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4851,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4848\/revisions\/4851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdc.fw-web.space\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSunday September 4
\nAfternoon Session
\nThird Round<\/strong>
\nJoe Cullen 6-4 Jim Williams
\nRusty-Jake Rodriguez 6-4 Madars Razma
\nJosh Rock 6-5 Dirk van Duijvenbode
\nDave Chisnall 6-3 Boris Krcmar
\nJose de Sousa 6-4 Jeffrey de Zwaan
\nWilliam O’Connor 6-5 Michael Smith
\nNathan Aspinall 6-4 Karel Sedlacek
\nRyan Meikle 6-5 Simon Whitlock<\/p>\n
\nQuarter-Finals<\/strong>
\nJoe Cullen 6-4 Rusty-Jake Rodriguez
\nDave Chisnall 6-0 Josh Rock
\nWilliam O’Connor 6-4 Jose de Sousa
\nNathan Aspinall 6-5 Ryan Meikle<\/p>\n
\nJoe Cullen 7-6 Dave Chisnall
\nWilliam O’Connor 7-5 Nathan Aspinall<\/p>\n
\nJoe Cullen 8-2 William O’Connor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"