Presteigne’s Jim Williams suffered a disappointing first round exit last night at the World Darts Championship in a close contest.

Williams lost to Paolo Nebrida of the Phillipines, who got his first win on the Alexandra Palace stage in London.

The Welshman went in to the match as the favourite after he reached the third round at last year’s World Championship, beating Norman Madhoo and two-time world champion, Peter Wright.

However, this time around Williams got off to a slow start, losing the first set narrowly to Nebrida.

Jim recovered well from his early set back and largely dominated the second set to tie the game up at 1-1.

Although following that, it was Paolo Nebrida’s turn to fight back as he took the third set, giving himself a 2-1 lead heading into the fourth set.

Knowing that he had to win the fourth set to stay in the competition, Jim seemed to find his form and won the fourth set three legs to nil with ease.

With the game tied at two sets apiece, it went down to the final set where the man from Presteigne looked the more likely to carry his momentum and progress to the next round.

In the fifth and final set Williams took a two legs to one lead and just needed to finish the game off to make him victorious, however the Welshman struggled with his checkouts, and missed an agonising five match winning darts, opening the door for Nebrida to snatch the game away from Jim, which he did.

The final score was Paolo Nebrida 3-2 Jim Williams.

A disappointing night for the Carpenter from Presteigne who was one of six Welshmen to compete at this year’s World Championship. This is the first time Jim has failed to reach the second round in the competition. His opponent, Paolo Nebrida will now go on to face Ross Smith.