Premier League Darts 2026 news: Ranking all eight players ahead of the play-offs

As the Premier League Darts regular season comes to a close and attention turns to the upcoming ranking majors, now is as good a time as ever to assess the tournament overall.

Here, Sports News Blitz writer Charlie Fawcett takes a look through the eight arrowsmiths and ranks their 2026 campaigns.

Luke Littler – 4.5/5

Despite picking up six nightly wins, including three on the spin at the back end of the season, the world number one just missed out on a perfect five.

This is because it did take The Nuke a while to get into his stride this year, with the teenager massively struggling in the early weeks.

I think that the current format does work in the favour of the very top talents in the field, however, as there is little chance that a player with the overwhelming quality of Littler isn’t going to come good eventually.

Indeed, it cannot be denied that once Littler got into his stride, he hasn’t really looked back, picking up 43 points en route to winning the league phase by 11 points.

That puts him in good stead to win back the title from Luke Humphries.

Jonny Clayton – 5/5

I know you’re all thinking that this seems unfair but if you look at the context of the situation, it all makes sense!

Clayton came into this event as the rank outsider within the eight-strong field, and right from the off he grabbed the challenge by the scruff of its neck and racked up enough points in the first half of the season to stroll into the play-offs.

Going all the way through the play-offs to win the title feels like a big ask given the two Lukes will likely be his opposition, but if ‘the year of the ferret’ was to repeat itself, anything is possible.

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Luke Humphries – 3.5/5

Once again, context is key here – given that Cool Hand came into the event as world number two, he certainly made hard work of reaching the final four.

Humphries did, however, pull out all the stops in clutch moments, which is ultimately what champions do.

His night-15 victory over Littler in Birmingham was a perfect example of this as it ensured that the reigning champ reached the play-offs with a week to spare.

Gerwyn Price – 3.5/5

I think it has to be the same score again for Gezzy, with the Welshman and Humphries having almost identical campaigns.

Yet, it has to be said that Price has made a habit of reaching this stage of the Premier League after going nine years into his career before reaching this far.

Since then, he has reached the final in 2023 and will make it back-to-back Premier League finals nights this Thursday at the O2.

He also picked up two nightly wins along the way to reach this position and has a relatively good record against semi-final opponent Littler.

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Stephen Bunting – 3/5

Bunting did secure fifth spot after picking up his second nightly win in Sheffield last week, which in fairness is much better than his last place finish in 2025.

However, this doesn’t really tell the whole story as it was another campaign riddled with early exits for the Bullet.

Despite late improvements, it still has to go down as a tournament to forget.

Michael van Gerwen – 3/5

This will be only the third finals night since his debut that will not include Mighty Mike and a second on the spin after he just missed out in fifth place in 2025.

It cannot be disputed that Van Gerwen has had a tough time for a couple of years now, with complications in his personal life impacting his form, and this tournament was no exception.

Van Gerwen never really got going on the Premier League circuit this year, but with plenty of ranking events still to go, the Dutch number two will be desperate to return to his best.

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Gian van Veen – 2/5

Coming into his debut season as a World Championship finalist, Van Veen was tipped to go far at this year’s Premier League and potentially go all the way.

That just adds to the disappointment around the world number three, who ultimately couldn’t find enough.

It is never fun to have the play-offs out of realistic reach with a number of nights still to play, but Van Veen learnt this lesson the hard way.

However, he will almost certainly be back in the line-up for 2027 and I would be amazed if he hasn’t picked up another major or two by that point.

Josh Rock – 1.5/5

It felt far too harsh giving him a one, but poor old Rocky has had a stinker in the Premier League in his debut year.

Bizarrely, during this wretched form, he picked up a Euro Tour title, so clearly his form isn’t dwindling and this may well be a blip.

He will be hoping so as he looks to defend his World Cup title alongside Northern Ireland team-mate Daryl Gurney in June.

Regardless, four match wins across 16 nightly tournaments is just quite frankly not good enough.

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