Jonny Clayton has fired back at his Premier League ‘doubters’ after he started the season as an ‘outsider’ to make Finals Night by the bookies…
2021 Premier League Darts winner Jonny Clayton made his return to the Premier League line-up this year after going the previous two seasons without a call-up.
The Ferret had a resurgent season in 2025 making the final of both the Winmau World Masters and World Cup of Darts alongside a trio of back-to-back semi-final runs at the UK Open, World Matchplay and World Grand Prix.
A few years ago, Jonny Clayton was actually considering quitting darts as he struggled for form and motivation, however, the 51-year-old has made a very strong comeback since that admission.
The 2025 form moved Clayton as high as fifth in the world rankings (a position he still holds) and earned him a deserved call-up to the 2026 Premier League.
Clayton had an incredibly strong Premier League record going into this year’s tournament. He won the tournament on his debut campaign in 2021 and followed that up with two semi-final finishes (including a season where he topped the table).
When you include this season, Jonny Clayton has finished top four in the table in all four of his seasons in Premier League Darts.
Despite his history in the campaign, the bookmakers had him classed as an ‘outsider’ to make the top four when the campaign began this year and that’s something Clayton admits to taking very personally…
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Jonny Clayton on Proving His Premier League Doubters Wrong
Jonny Clayton comfortably qualified for Finals Night, finishing second in the table after the sixteen weeks of action.
Clayton would hold top position in the league table for a large portion of the campaign thanks to his four nightly wins, double that of any other player except for table topper Luke Littler who managed six in total.
Clinical Clayton 🙌
— PDC Darts (@OfficialPDC) May 28, 2026
Jonny Clayton celebrated the first of his four nightly victories this season with a spectacular 156 checkout to triumph on Night Three in Glasgow!
Can The Ferret fire at The O2 tonight? 🔥 pic.twitter.com/e0SIl3tVOn
He also led the way with clinical finishing, having a checkout percentage of 44.77% for the campaign.
Overall, Jonny Clayton has shown that he is one of the elite players in world darts and had a point to prove after being ‘written off’ so early in the campaign.
Speaking to talkSPORT Darts ahead of the 2026 Premier League Darts Play-Offs, Clayton would reveal his underlying motivation during the league phase stating:
“I don’t really care what people say but do you know when the bookies say that I was the favourite to finish bottom, obviously they don’t look at rankings, obviously they don’t look at history…
“When they said I was favourite to finish bottom, that really did hurt so that was a kick in the backside to prove people wrong.
“At the end of the day, I was safe with four weeks to go so I’ve done something right and obviously the bookies don’t understand a lot about darts. Especially with The Ferret.”
He would actually mention a few times during the same interview how much it hurt him to see comments writing him off or questioning whether he deserved a spot in the Premier League this year.
In fairness to Clayton, he used the negativity as motivation and that fueled him for an excellent league phase and has positioned him with a chance to win the title.
Clayton will face reigning title holder Luke Humphries in the second semi-final match of the night.
Humphries was struggling for a large portion of the campaign with wins not necessarily reflecting his performances considering he finished the campaign with the highest league average of 101.20.
A late run of form though, secured him third place in the table and gave him some good momentum going into the Play-Offs.
Regardless of the result tonight, Jonny Clayton has shown his pedigree in this tournament format and likely won’t be ‘written off’ so easily for a future campaign… 👀
See his full pre-match interview with talkSPORT Darts below:
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