Dobey dumped out by Gilding as Bunting progresses

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World number eight Chris Dobey suffered a shock second round exit at the World Darts Championship with a 3-1 loss to Andrew Gilding.

Gilding, 55, came from behind to beat Dobey 3-1 at Alexandra Palace, finishing with a career best tournament average of 99.01.

Dobey was one of four seeded players to exit the second round on Saturday alongside Dave Chisnall, Michael Smith and Dirk van Duijvenbode.

Having lost the opening set, Gilding dropped only three more three legs as he set up a third round meeting with either Luke Woodhouse or Max Hopp after Christmas.

"I feel amazing. I felt really bad in practice, that's usually a good sign, you can only get better from there," Gilding told Sky Sports.

"The first thing I wanted was a nine-darter and the second was a win, so I got the second one."

Meanwhile, world number four Stephen Bunting won in straight sets against Nitin Kumar, whose first-round victory was the first by an Indian player at the tournament.

Bunting impressed by taking checkouts of 118, 107 and 132 with a 53% success rate on doubles and 94.11 average, while Kumar won just two legs and averaged 75.18.

The Bullet will next face England's James Hurrell, who earlier beat world number 29 Van Duijvenbode 3-2.

The 2023 world champion Smith, seeded 28th, exited the competition with a 3-1 loss to Niels Zonneveld of the Netherlands.

Despite averaging just shy of 98, Smith was unable to topple Zonneveld who took the last two sets to reach the third round for the first time, where he will face world number five Jonny Clayton.

Wales' Clayton was due to face Dom Taylor in the second round during Saturday's evening session, but was handed a bye after his opponent was suspended following a failed drugs test.

Former semi-finalist Chisnall suffered a 3-2 defeat to Germany's Ricardo Pietreczko.

World number 21 Chisnall fired in 11 180s to none from Pietreczko and came from 2-0 down to force a fifth set, but the German took the decider to set up a third round tie with Sweden's Andreas Harrysson.

Nine of Chisnall's maximums came after going 2-0 down but after the Englishman missed a dart at double 16 on a 143 checkout to clinch victory, Pietreczko reeled off three straight legs for victory.

The 20th seed Ryan Searle started this year's second round with a blistering 3-0 win over Northern Ireland's Brendan Dolan.

Searle averaged 98.67 and landed nine of his 14 attempts on the doubles to knock out two-time quarter-finalist Dolan.

Harrysson booked his place in the last 32 with a comfortable 3-0 defeat of fellow tournament debutant Motomu Sakai.

Earlier in the day, Scottish teenager Mitchell Lawrie won the JDC World Youth Championship with a 5-2 win over Kaya Baysal.

Afternoon session

Ryan Searle 3-0 Brendan Dolan

Andreas Harrysson 3-0 Motomu Sakai

Dirk van Duijvenbode 2-3 James Hurrell

Dave Chisnall 2-3 Ricardo Pietreczko

Evening session

Michael Smith 1-3 Niels Zonneveld

Chris Dobey 1-3 Andrew Gilding