Ever since the World Darts Federation (WDF) took over the running of the World Championships and World Masters in 2020, one of the WDF's main goals has been to elevate the opportunities available to the youth players in our system.
We started this at Lakeside in 2022 by expanding the final stage of the Boys World Championship to four players and introducing a Girls World Championship. These moves were positively received by both darts fans and our member countries, many of whom have gone on to host Youth-specific events in recent years.
The WDF is proud to announce the next stage of those plans - a further expansion to the final stages of the Boys and Girls World Championships in 2024. Now, eight boys and four girls will get the chance to compete for glory at 'The Home of World Darts'.
That expansion necessitates a change in qualification criteria. The first four boys and two girls to qualify for the 2024 WDF World Championships will be determined by the results of the Boys Qualifier and Girls Qualifier held during the World Masters festivities between October 9th and October 13th.
To better reward the member countries running events and the players that have consistently excelled in WDF Youth ranking tournaments throughout 2024, the remaining four Boys and two Girls competing at Lakeside will be the highest-ranked players in the respective Boys and Girls ranking tables at the end of the 2023/24 WDF ranking season (28/10/24) that have not qualified through the WDF World Championship qualifiers.
WDF Youth Commissioner Dietmar Schuhmann said: "Today's announcement is momentous for both the WDF and the talented youngsters supporting our system.
"The talent levels coming through the Youth game are rising all the time - just look at Luke Littler and Beau Greaves - and many of the WDF's member countries have worked with me to run more and more Youth-specific events.
"Rewarding their efforts and giving the young players participating in their events more to aim for was a key objective of mine as Youth Commissioner. We've managed to do that with this expansion to the Boys and Girls World Championships, as the ranking tables now mean something more tangible.
"Twice as many young players will now get the chance to play on that incredible Lakeside stage - I can't wait to see who follows in the footsteps of our 2023 winners Bradley van der Velden and Aurora Fochesato!"
Full qualification criteria for both the Boys WDF World Championship and Girls WDF World Championship are now viewable on our Rules page. Further details on the October qualifier will be revealed before the end of May, while information on the prize fund of, and format for, the final stages at Lakeside will follow later in the year.
To make it easier to see who is on course to qualify for Lakeside, we have created ranking race tables for both the Boys and Girls World Championship.
Further information on the qualification criteria for the Men’s and Women’s World Championships will be provided soon.
