“ It was good to be back on stage and hopefully I can keep moving forward now ”
starting to build my game again and I ’ m excited . I ’ m scoring well and if I can put my scoring and finishing together , I ’ ll be hard to beat .”
Richie Burnett and Matthew Edgar were the other two winners from the main stage , with the duo producing wins over Ricky Sudale and Colin Osborne respectively .
“ I dug in really well there and it will give me a lot of confidence ,” said Burnett .
“ I ’ m really relieved to be through because I ’ ve been struggling a bit of late , but who knows what can happen this weekend now !”
“ It was good to be back on stage and hopefully I can keep moving forward now ”
Ted Hankey
Steve West exacted revenge for his brother Tony as he recorded a 5-3 victory over Jake Pennington .
There were also a second set of brothers competing in the event , with Joey and Lee Palfreyman both entering the fray in round two and both producing wins over Keegan Brown and Mark Walsh respectively .
Stephen Bunting lost his first two legs of the competition as he went 2-0 down to Jason Wilson , but the impressive Bunting found some form at the right time as he produced a 132 checkout of bull , bull and double sixteen on his way to producing a come from behind 5-2 victory .
Kirk Shepherd showed more signs of his continued return to form as he produced a fine display to defeat Magnus Caris 5-1 . Shepherd was joined in the third round by qualifiers Conan Whitehead , Dean Stewart and Andy Boulton who produced wins over Kevin Thomas , Steven Mead and Alex Roy respectively .
There were also good signs for Dennis Smith and Jelle Klaasen , the duo were both looking to return to winning ways and both made progress to the third round with victories over Gary Stone and Scott Robertson respectively .
Reebok Stadium played host to possibly the most exciting UK Open in history
Photo : Mike Glover / UK Darts
Amongst the big names to fall in the final action from day one were Co Stompe , who found himself on the wrong end of a 5-4 scoreline in his match with Michael Mansell , and Nigel Heydon who went down by the same scoreline against Andy Jenkins .
Andy Smith has been battling to retain his place in the World ’ s elite and a 5-3 win over James Hubbard will certainly have helped his cause as it ensured he would leave Bolton with at least £ 1,000 in prize money .
There were also important wins for Mark Cox , Adam Hunt , Jyhan Artut , Matt Padgett , Mark Lawrence , Jim Walker , Gaz Cousins , Joe Cullen , Terry Temple , William O ’ Connor and Richie Howson .