Gary Anderson: I’m ready for a cracking contest between me Michael van Gerwen

Anthony Joshua and Alexander Povetkin have nothing on the heavyweight contest ahead of us at the Champions League of Darts on Sunday.

The big two on Planet Darts meet as Gary Anderson needs a victory over Michael van Gerwen to keep his hopes of qualification for a semi-final in Brighton going.

The Flying Scotsman wasted no time in dispatching an out-of-sorts Dave Chisnall 10-3 in his second Group A outing, but better challenges lie ahead for him.

Despite racing into a 7-3 lead at the mid-session interval, Anderson admitted to Paddy Power News he was still wary of a Chizzy comeback.

“I’ll sleep well tonight after that win over Dave Chisnall. Even when I was 7-3 up, I was wary of Dave because he can go on the rampage,” said Anderson.

“However, it’s not the Dave we used to play, but he’s getting back to that. He’s just not quite there, but he’s too good of a player not to come back to the big time – scoring wise he’s fantastic.

A loss to Daryl Gurney in his opening contest was also heavily on his mind when he spoke and Anderson knew exactly where he made mistakes in the game.

I played well this morning, but I was just making silly mistakes and throwing stupid darts for no reason at all.

“Daryl took some big finishes out when I was going to get a shot at a double to his credit, and that happens – it’s darts after all.”

Asked about his showdown with the world number one, Anderson was under no illusions of what’s required of him.

“I play Michael van Gerwen now tomorrow. If I can turn up and play, hopefully it will be a cracker,” said The Flying Scotsman.

“If I don’t, then it will be quite an easy walk through for Van Gerwen. I’ll be trying to begin at 100% against him though.”

Finally, Anderson got seven darts towards a perfect nine-darter with the crowd set to benefit from a £50,000 prize pot if it’s hit in Brighton this weekend. He’s making no bones about it, he’s after our money for the fans.

“I was trying to take that nine-dart money off Paddy Power for the crowd, I’m going to try my damnedest to do that, trust me.

“When the seventh dart went in I said, ‘I fancy this’. I just went a bit limp on the treble 19. I think someone will hit it this weekend though and cost Paddy Power a few quid.”