King hits double top to take first titles of year

Mervyn King completed a clean sweep of the PDC ProTour events in Swindon with a 6-1 defeat of Simon Whitlock to win the UK Open Qualifier at the Oasis Leisure Centre.

King, from Bradwell, backed up Saturday's Players Championship victory with another classy display to claim the �6,000 top prize from the first of eight UK Open Qualifiers to be held in the coming months.

Having overcome a scare in Sunday's opening game, when he battled from behind to defeat Anastasia Dobromyslova in a deciding leg, King then swept to 6-3 wins against Lowestoft rival Peter Wright, Premier League Darts opponent Ronnie Baxter, Jamie Caven and Wayne Jones.

In the semi-finals, he landed seven 180s in a 6-4 defeat of world number two James Wade - repeating his Whyte & Mackay Premier League Darts win on Thursday against the left-hander - before defeating Whitlock in the final.

King made an early statement of intent in the decider, taking out 117 in the opening leg, double one to break Whitlock's throw in the second, and a 14-darter to move 3-0 up.

Double top for a 14-darter in reply saw Whitlock get off the mark, but King kicked off the fifth leg with a maximum and took out 104 for a 4-1 cushion, then finished 80 to win the sixth leg before wrapping up the win in the next.

"I'm lost for words," admitted an emotional King afterwards. "I can't explain how it feels to have won both ProTour events in a weekend.

"It means everything to me and I'm so proud, because to win one tournament is an achievement in itself, but to win two is as good as it gets.

"I played some fantastic darts on Saturday and did it again today. My new darts are feeling like a part of me now and to play for two days running at that standard is phenomenal."

King joins an elite group of players to have won both PDC ProTour events staged in one weekend, with Phil Taylor, Adrian Lewis and Robert Thornton also achieving the feat.