Dan Dawson picks five players to shine at the Summer Series

Ryan Searle

Commentator Dan Dawson has picked out five players to shine at the PDC Summer Series, which gets underway on Wednesday.

Dawson will be joined by Paul Nicholson and Chris Murphy as part of the PDCTV commentary team across the five days of Players Championship events from July 8-12.

Michael van Gerwen

5. Michael van Gerwen
"Mighty Mike" has been enduring the biggest challenge to his dominance of the sport since becoming world number one.
Peter Wright denied him the William Hill World Championship title; Gerwyn Price no longer fears him; Gary Anderson has returned from injury; and the likes of Aspinall, Durrant, and Smith are snapping away at their heels in the chasing pack.
It took until the UK Open in March for MvG to win his first title of 2020 (an unprecedented wait in recent years), but he insists it will be "business as usual" when he returns to action.
Usual business for Van Gerwen means winning multiple titles... and if his actions match his words, it should be a spectacular week in the Marshall Arena.

Krzysztof Ratajski

4. Krzysztof Ratajski
?  ?
The Polish Eagle's coming
And everybody's jumping
From Warsaw to Milton Keynes
You know he's gonna win things
We like Ratajski
We like
We like Ratajski
??

He's just mint - and he's up to 15th in the world rankings for a reason.

Mervyn King

3. Mervyn King
The Summer Series is a big week for one of the legends of the game, with Merv's hopes of making the Betfred World Matchplay hanging by a thread.
The former Premier League finalist admitted back in February that Michael Smith had helped him iron-out some problems in practice and that he was feeling better about his game.
However, unless he picks up a big chunk of ranking money in Milton Keynes, this will be the first World Matchplay since 2006 that has not included "The King".  Really?!?!

Ryan Searle

2. Ryan Searle
The man that Aspinall beat in the final to claim his first PDC title towards the end of 2018 has not kicked-on in the same way as "The Asp", but things have changed this year.
The former window cleaner finally claimed his first title back in February, beating a succession of big name players along the way - including Michael van Gerwen in the final.
Things are starting to happen for "Heavy Metal" and if he can pick up where he left off back in March, then I expect him to make the top 32 in the world rankings before the end of the year.

Nathan Aspinall

1.  Nathan Aspinall
In truth, Nathan has been one to watch for the last two years, as he rocketed from the level of promising talent to one of the world's best.
"The Asp" had already won two of the eight Players Championship events before lockdown, and then continued his winning streak by becoming the Low6 Home Tour Champion.
This man wins things, be it TV titles in Minehead and Vegas, Players Championships in Barnsley and Wigan, or even if he's playing online darts in his kitchen.