Mardle claims darts stars are facing ‘rankings blackmail’ as PDC calendar expands

WAYNE MARDLE reckons darts stars are facing “rankings blackmail” as they battle to secure their places at the sport’s biggest events.

Former pro Mardle believes the pressure to feature at all major tournaments is playing a huge role in how players approach their schedules, with the PDC schedule continuing to expand.

There will be 34 Players Championship events and 15 European Tour tournaments in 2027, including a debut event in France.

The inaugural European Open will also take place in Salzburg from June 18-20, featuring all PDC Tour Card holders competing for a £750,000 prize fund.

In addition, the new tournament will take the number of Premier events from 11 to 12, giving players even more opportunities to compete for silverware.

But Mardle believes the growing calendar has created a situation where players cannot simply pick and choose their tournaments without considering the potential impact on their Order of Merit.

He told Tungsten Tales: “I do think you have to kind of evaluate what’s happening with your year with how you’re going with your rankings because everyone is facing this rankings blackmail.

“I call it blackmail because everyone wants to qualify for certain events, whether it be the Premier League or want to be top four.

“There are some that are never involved in it because they are No. 1 or No. 2.

“So those that are not top four, that are five, six, seven, eight, want to make sure they're in that for the Premier League, and those that are outside that want to be in it for the World Grand Prix or the World Series.

“There's always this rankings blackmail going on. The way it was back in the day, there was never this amount of events.

“There’s so many now. So, we just played in them all. A lot of the players now miss certain ones.

“And I think to set out your year and say, ‘I'm doing this’ is probably wrong because you may qualify for everything with ease and then you're playing just for the sake of playing.

“But what I do believe, and everyone's different, you've got to keep your arm ticking over and you've got to keep it ticking over competitively, keep that mind focused.

“And once you do have a month off, and Gerwyn Price says this a lot, ‘I need to play to get that competitive edge back.’ And he says that edge back because it can go. It really can go.

“A lot of the players need to evaluate how their year is going, and I think that is the way of doing it.”

Image: Taylor Lanning