The Masters (also known as the

Cazoo Cazoo is a British online car retailer based in London, England which was founded in 2018 by Alex Chesterman. History Cazoo was founded in 2018 by British internet entrepreneur Alex Chesterman. It launched an online marketplace for used cars i ...

Masters for sponsorship purposes) is a non-ranking PDC darts tournament which features the top 24 darts players according to the

PDC Order of Merit The PDC Order of Merit is a world ranking system used by one of the darts organisations, the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC). Following the 2007 PDC World Darts Championship it superseded a world ranking system based on points being awarded f ...

as of 2021.

History

The inaugural tournament, held in 2013, was won by Phil Taylor, who defeated

Adrian Lewis Adrian Lewis (born 21 January 1985) is an English professional darts player currently playing in the PDC. He is a two-time PDC World Darts Champion, winning in 2011 and 2012. He is nicknamed Jackpot, as he won a jackpot gambling in Las Vegas ...

10–1 in the final.

James Wade James Martin Wade (born 6 April 1983) is an English professional darts player, currently playing in the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC). He became the youngest player to win a major PDC title, when he won the 2007 World Matchplay at th ...

won the following year by defeating Mervyn King 11–10 in the 2014 final. Michael van Gerwen became the third different champion in 3 years when he defeated

Raymond van Barneveld Raymond van Barneveld (born 20 April 1967) is a Dutch professional darts player. Nicknamed Barney, although originally known as The Man, he is one of the most successful darts players in history. Van Barneveld is a five-time World Darts Cham ...

11–6. In 2013 and 2014, the tournament took place in the

Royal Highland Centre The Royal Highland Centre, originally the Royal Highland Showground, is an exhibition centre and showground located at Ingliston in the western outskirts of Edinburgh, Scotland, adjacent to Edinburgh Airport and the A8. History The Royal H ...

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...

and was played in early November. However, the tournament was moved to early February in 2015 and had a new venue at the Arena MK (renamed Marshall Arena in 2019) in

Milton Keynes Milton Keynes ( ) is a city and the largest settlement in Buckinghamshire, England, about north-west of London. At the 2021 Census, the population of its urban area was over . The River Great Ouse forms its northern boundary; a tributary ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. The tournament has been held in late January/early February ever since.

Format

From 2013 to 2020, the tournament featured the top 16 of the

Order of Merit The Order of Merit (french: link=no, Ordre du Mérite) is an order of merit for the Commonwealth realms, recognising distinguished service in the armed forces, science, art, literature, or for the promotion of culture. Established in 1902 by ...

, in a fixed draw (1 plays 16, 2 plays 15 and so on). The first round and the quarter finals are played over best of 19 legs, the semi-finals and the final are played over best of 21 legs. For the 2021 tournament, the participants increased from the Top 16 to the Top 24, with the Top 8 automatically going to the second round and the players seeded 9 to 24 playing in the best of 11 legs first round.

Masters finals

Records and statistics

Total finalist appearances

* Active players are shown in bold * Only players who reached the final are included * In the event of identical records, players are sorted in alphabetical order by family name

Champions by country

High averages

Media coverage

The Masters is broadcast by

ITV4 ITV4 is a British free-to-air television channel which was launched on 1 November 2005. It is owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc, and is part of the ITV network. The channel has a line-up that consists of sports, cult clas ...

in the United Kingdom and

RTL7 RTL 7 is a Dutch free-to-cable television channel that was launched as ''Veronica'' on 1 September 1995. RTL 7 is RTL Nederland's "men's channel" with action films, reality television about crime and professions, soccer, motorsport and talk sho ...

in the Netherlands.

References

External links

Masters at Darts Database

The Masters page on the PDC website
{{PDC Darts Tournaments Professional Darts Corporation tournaments Darts in the United Kingdom Recurring sporting events established in 2013 2013 establishments in Scotland Annual sporting events in the United Kingdom