PDC European Tour 2021: Gerwyn Price, Michael van Gerwen, Peter Wright headline Hungarian Darts Trophy field
Hungarian Darts Trophy has added significance as it is the penultimate event before the qualification cut-off for the World Grand Prix which you can see live on Sky Sports in October
Friday 3 September 2021 12:01, UK
After a break of 10 months, the PDC's European Tour resumes this weekend as the Hungarian Darts Trophy signals the start of the second half of the season and a high-class field led by world No 1 Gerwyn Price has assembled in Budapest.
With coronavirus restrictions severely impacting travel across the world, the European Tour has been affected with just four events taking place last season before the European Championship in November.
This year there will be just two as for the first time, Budapest will host a PDC event to get the two-event calendar underway on Friday where 48 players will battle it out over three days for the £20,000 first prize.
A second European Tour event is scheduled for Gibraltar last this month, before the top 32 players from an Order of Merit across the two tournaments meet in Salzburg for the European Championship in October where Peter Wright defends his title.
Price is seeded fifth for the event, with Michael van Gerwen seeded fourth and in-form Peter Wright, who claimed the World Matchplay in Blackpool in July, the third seed.
Joe Cullen and Jose De Sousa top the rankings for the tournament which will begin on Friday when the 32 qualifiers meet in the first round for the right to meet the seeded names who enter in Saturday's second round.
Sherrock joined by big names for Copenhagen showpiece
Michael van Gerwen, Gary Anderson, Peter Wright and Jonny Clayton are among the names who will join Fallon Sherrock at the Nordic Darts Masters later this month.
Sherrock has star billing for the first World Series event since 2019 after the coronavirus pandemic wiped out events in Copenhagen, New York and Australia - all of which were set to feature the Queen of the Palace after her star turn at the World Championship in December 2019.
However, with all five events cancelled, Sherrock's only outing was at the World Series of Darts Finals where she was beaten in a last-leg decider against Jeff Smith
The PDC has vowed to honour the opportunities that were granted to Sherrock after her victories over Ted Evetts and Mensur Suljovic and that starts in Copenhagen later this month for the Nordic Darts Masters.
The make-up of the rest of the field was greeted with a little more surprise, as Grand Slam of Darts champion and Premier League runner-up Jose De Sousa was overlooked.
World champion and world No 1 Gerwyn Price head the names and he is joined by the second and third-ranked players in the world - Peter Wright and Michael van Gerwen.
Newly-crowned Premier League champion Jonny Clayton is joined by Nathan Aspinall and Dimitri Van den Bergh, while two-time world champion Gary Anderson completes the field.
The two-day event which features eight regional representatives going up against the eight PDC names and will be the first time a World Series event has taken place in Scandinavia after the success of Australia, New Zealand the United States.
Darts is back on your Sky Sports screens in September when the World Cup of Darts takes place in Germany, all four days of action will be live - coverage begins on Thursday September 9
