This season’s Players Championship circuit has already produced three maiden floor title winners – and we have not even reached the halfway mark yet. At this rate, by November there’ll be somebody winning one after accidentally wandering in looking for the toilets.

So far, the campaign has largely resembled an Anglo-Dutch monopoly, with the only champion outside of England or the Netherlands being a very loud Welshman who celebrates hitting a winning double like he’s won the lottery. And I am not referring to the mammal monikered one who just points to the camera.

Calling a spade a spade, Wessel Nijman is absolutely pissing it in 2026. The Dutchman has already amassed five titles and is now at that terrifying stage where players begin applauding if he exits a venue prematurely. Partly out of admiration and partly because they’re just relieved he can no longer beat them that day. In terms of creating main stream news (of a darting nature), Wes is currently up there with the latest goings on between America and Iran.

The lad is operating with frightening authority and, remarkably, is yet to lose an opening match all season. When the draw gets released nowadays, seeing Nijman next to your name has the frightening impact of being thrown a grenade with your gas bill attached to it.

So let’s have a proper butchers at that trio who in 2026, have finally captured a maiden Players Championship title.

BEAU GREAVES

Let’s be honest – if any woman was going to win one of these things, it was always going to be Beau Greaves. Not simply because she is the only female tour card holder, although admittedly that does narrow the field down somewhat. It is merely due to the Yorkshire star possessing a continuous habit of winning every tour she’s on.

The three-time Lakeside Champion has dominated the PDC Women’s Series with the sort of relentlessness usually reserved for traffic wardens on crack. Week after week when performing when fellow females, she strolls through fields like somebody playing darts on beginner mode.

So whilst some perhaps acted shocked when she lifted a floor title in Milton Keynes, most people within the sport reacted with little more than a shrug and a well yeah, obviously. If anything, the surprise was that it took this long.

Now, Matt Edgar – of Edgar TV fame and owner of far too much WWE memorabilia – rightly pointed out that should Greaves climb beyond a certain ranking threshold, the Women’s Series may effectively become redundant for her. Personally, that feels a touch unfair.

I completely understand why the PDC are not exactly enthusiastic about blokes rocking up at the Women’s Series for a game. But Beau being effectively penalised for being too good at darts feels slightly daft. It is hardly her fault she throws arrows better than half the men currently travelling Europe surviving on airport sandwiches and lukewarm energy drinks.

ANDREW GILDING

From Greaves to Goldfinger – another player who approaches darts with the emotional turbulence of a man quietly waiting for a toaster to pop.

Gilding and Beau actually share remarkably similar demeanours. Neither appears remotely flustered. Both wander to the oche looking as though they are about to ask whether anybody wants a brew rather than perform in front of cameras and screaming punters.

Like the Doncaster prodigy, Gilding already possessed a mammoth television title courtesy of his UK Open triumph a few years ago – memorably celebrated with all the outward hysteria of somebody acknowledging an expectant parcel delivery. Yet bizarrely, the 55-year-old had never captured a Pro Tour title. Know, he is the only Bond villain to receive such an accolade.

Earlier this year he reached a final in Leicester, only for Gerwyn Price to flatten him like a steamroller going over a digestive biscuit. More recently though, Gilding returned and defeated Price’s compatriot and close friend Jonny Clayton to finally tick that elusive achievement off his darting bingo card.

The Norfolkian (quite possibly made up) is the very definition of a cult hero. He is essentially the tungsten equivalent of the television programme Countdown. Quiet. Peculiar. Hugely comforting. Mildly confusing.

The man rocks up to venues almost exclusively on his Jack Jones, usually wearing a duffel coat despite temperatures outside resembling the surface of Mercury. Add in a woolly beanie hat, a flask and an expression suggesting he’s accidentally turned up three hours early for a dentist appointment, and you have the full Andrew Gilding experience.

Conversation is minimal. In fact, pairing Gilding with Krzysztof Ratajski for an afternoon would probably produce fewer combined words than a library after a bomb scare.

Then, once defeated, he simply vanishes. No fuss. No entourage. No dramatic exit. One minute he is there averaging 110, the next he has evaporated into the night like a darts-playing Batman sponsored by Yorkshire Tea.

KEVIN DOETS

The way Doets began this season, it increasingly felt inevitable that a maiden title was eventually coming. Week after week, the Dutchman was enjoying more semis than a hormonal teenager with access to the adult channel and brave decision-making.

Then came Hildesheim, Germany – the venue many can’t be arsed to go to. Event thirteen of the year – unlucky for some, but evidently not for Doets. By the end of the day, he had launched that metaphorical monkey from his back with such force the poor primate probably landed somewhere on the roof of Halle 39 requiring counselling and a neck brace.

His nickname, Hawkeye, exists because the man barely blinks. And before anyone asks, yes – I know this because I invented it. Kevin lives in Sweden nowadays which, selfishly, became a logistical pain in the arse for me because regardless of where the Pro Tour was held, he invariably had to fly into Gatwick or Heathrow. Meaning yours truly had to clock up the miles for a Dutch darts player with the visual focus of a peregrine falcon hunting field mice.

So during the endless airport drives, we would kill time with geography quizzes before eventually moving onto nickname brainstorming sessions once Kevin inevitably grew sick of hearing me ask things like What’s the capital of Uzbekistan?

Eventually, Hawkeye stuck. Naturally, his success has absolutely nothing to do with me comparing his facial habits to a bird of prey. The truth is, Doets always possessed the ability to win titles. Things are finally synchronising for him now and the confidence is visibly growing with every event.

That victory in Germany will not be the last trophy he lifts this season either. I would go as far as saying there is a European Tour title with his name all over it in 2026 – and no, I do not mean the inaugural Doets Darting Open held in downtown Doetsville beside the ABBA museum and a Swedish massage parlour.