Gerwyn Price to face Nathan Aspinall in Poland Masters quarter-final

Joel Barnett

Welshman Gerwyn Price, pictured competing in the Premier League of Darts in MayProfimedia

Top seed Gerwyn Price will face Nathan Aspinall in an all-British quarter-final after both players eased to victory at the inaugural World Series of Darts in Poland on Friday.

In front of a sell-out crowd at the COS Torwar in Warsaw, Price averaged 91.31 on his way to a 6-3 win over Lukasz Waclawski while Aspinall reached the last eight with a 6-2 victory over Boris Krcmar.

Waclawski had come through a 175-player field to qualify last weekend but was no match for a stuttering Price who won three legs in a row despite hitting only 6 of 19 first-time checkouts.

Aspinall's journey was much simpler as he dispatched Krcmar with relative ease by winning the last four legs - hitting two 180s in the final two.

Elsewhere, third seed Michael van Gerwen survived an almighty scare against 21-year-old Adam Gawlas to kick-start his bid for back-to-back World Series titles.

Gawlas, the UK Open semi-finalist, stormed into a shock 3-1 lead before the US Masters champion hit back to win the next five legs in a row to record a 6-3 victory and set up a quarter-final against Luke Humphries who beat Nandor Major 6-0.

Fourth seed Rob Cross is out of the tournament after suffering an agonising 6-3 loss to Poland's number one Krzysztof Ratajski.

Ratajski has enjoyed a stellar year, winning his ninth PDC ranking title in April and registering a world record pairs average of 118.10 at last month's World Cup of Darts, and held firm against the 2018 World Champion in front of a jubilant home crowd.

The 46-year-old will now come up against 10th seed Dimitri Van den Bergh in Saturday's quarter-final after the Belgian came from 3-0 down to beat Karel Sedlacek 6-4 in the opening match of the evening.

In the final match, world number one Michael Smith stormed past Krzysztof Kciuk 6-1 to book an intriguing quarter-final against eighth-seed Danny Noppert, who beat Radek Szaganski 6-2.

The quarter-finals, semi-finals and final will be held on Saturday 8th July, with the winner receiving a cheque for £60,000 and the fourth World Series title of 2023.