DARTS LEGEND ADMITS VAN GERWEN HAS LOST FEAR FACTOR

LEGEND Colin Lloyd believes Michael van Gerwen has lost his fear factor on the oche.

World No. 3 Van Gerwen is still awaiting a maiden Premier League nightly victory after 14 weeks of action.

Three-time World champion Van Gerwen failed to make it past the quarter-final in any of the eight Players Championship Events he has featured in this year.

‘The Green Machine’ has also lost 12 of his last 15 meetings with world number one Luke Humphries.

And MVG has been defeated by World champion Luke Littler in eight of their last 10 encounters.

Two-time major winner Lloyd highlighted the talents eradicating Van Gerwen’s dominance and admitted years at the top have taken it’s toll on the Dutchman.

He told talkSPORT: “There’s just far too many inconsistencies that’s crept into his game over a period of time and unfortunately for him it’s getting a little bit often now.

“I’m gonna say it like this he’s lost that fear factor now.

“He isn’t the once dominant player that he was. I’m certainly not putting him down cause he’s a class act and he’s a class fella.

“But you’ve got the likes of Littler, Humphries, Aspinall. Gezzy Price and people away from the Premier League at the moment like Jonny Clayton that all want a piece of the action.

“It gets tougher and tougher and tougher when you have so many people taking chunks out of you.

“Is it catching up with Michael? I personally think it is a little bit.

“He’s got nothing to feel bad about. He shouldn’t feel ashamed about anything.

“It happens to all of us at some point or another.

“He’s been around playing since 16 or 17 years old. He won the Winmau World Masters at 17 years old.

“He’s been on tour now for 19 years. It takes a lot out of you and he’s achieved an awful lot in those 19 years.

“Listen it sounds like I’m talking that now he is done.

“I’m not talking like that whatsoever.

“But this year in the Premier League has been a real battle for him.”

Despite this, Van Gerwen claimed his 38th Euro Tour title at the German Grand Prix last month and hit a nine-darter in the competition as he showed flashes of brilliance.

‘Might Mike’ also has the sixth highest against throw average this year with an impressive 99.55.

Van Gerwen currently sits in fourth in the Premier League table, a single point ahead of Nathan Aspinall, before they face each other in Aberdeen this Thursday.

Image by Taylor Lanning.