| Tournament Name: | 2008 Stan James World Matchplay |
| Dates: | 20–26 July 2008 |
| Venue: | Winter Gardens |
| Location: | Blackpool |
| Organisation: | PDC |
| Format: | Legs |
| Prize Fund: | £300,000 |
| Winners Share: | £60,000 |
| Winner: | Phil Taylor |
| Prev: | 2007 |
| Next: | 2009 |
The 2008 Stan James World Matchplay was the 15th annual staging of the World Matchplay darts tournament by the Professional Darts Corporation. The tournament took place at the Winter Gardens, Blackpool, from 20–26 July 2008.
World number three James Wade went into the competition as the defending champion and managed to reach the final for the third year in a row, but was defeated by top seed Phil Taylor 18–9 who won his ninth World Matchplay championship.
A total of £300,000 was available for the players, divided based on the following performances:[1]
| Position (no. of players) | Prize money (Total: £300,000) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Winner | align=center | (1) | align=center | £60,000 | |
| Runner-Up | align=center | (1) | align=center | £30,000 | |
| Semi-finalists | align=center | (2) | align=center | £17,000 | |
| Quarter-finalists | align=center | (4) | align=center | £12,000 | |
| Second round | align=center | (8) | align=center | £8,000 | |
| First round | align=center | (16) | align=center | £4,000 | |
| Nine-dart finish | align=center | (0) | align=center | £10,000 | |
The qualification process for the World Matchplay differed this year. The top 16 in the PDC Order of the Merit after the 2008 UK Open qualified automatically as the 16 seeds. The other 16 places would be made up of the 16 highest ranked players (not already in the top 16) from the 2008 Players Championship Order of Merit - decided by the various Player Championship events taking place on the PDC Pro Tour from January 2008 - the cutoff point was the Las Vegas Players Championship just before the 2008 Las Vegas Desert Classic.[2] [3]
Thus, the participants were:
John Part (second round)| Player | Eliminated | Played | Legs Won | Legs Lost | LWAT | 100+ | 140+ | 180s | High Checkout | 3-dart Average | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Phil Taylor | Winner | 5 | 74 | 34 | 30 | 143 | 92 | 36 | 160 | 104.81 | |
| James Wade | Final | 5 | 65 | 46 | 28 | 120 | 95 | 42 | 157 | 99.49 | |
| Wayne Mardle | Semi-finals | 4 | 47 | 51 | 16 | 133 | 65 | 12 | 155 | 89.20 | |
| Dennis Priestley | Semi-finals | 4 | 47 | 50 | 18 | 131 | 62 | 13 | 155 | 94.10 | |
| Raymond van Barneveld | Quarter-finals | 3 | 40 | 30 | 16 | 91 | 44 | 6 | 138 | 89.57 | |
| Kevin McDine | Quarter-finals | 3 | 29 | 33 | 9 | 87 | 35 | 15 | 160 | 92.69 | |
| Matt Clark | Quarter-finals | 3 | 35 | 26 | 11 | 75 | 34 | 9 | 161 | 90.80 | |
| Alan Tabern | Quarter-finals | 3 | 37 | 31 | 14 | 98 | 52 | 14 | 120 | 93.31 | |
| Mark Walsh | Second round | 2 | 19 | 19 | 7 | 60 | 26 | 12 | 96 | 97.72 | |
| Colin Osborne | Second round | 2 | 15 | 20 | 5 | 44 | 19 | 10 | 110 | 96.93 | |
| Ronnie Baxter | Second round | 2 | 17 | 17 | 7 | 44 | 23 | 4 | 102 | 93.20 | |
| Terry Jenkins | Second round | 2 | 21 | 19 | 9 | 52 | 30 | 9 | 160 | 92.79 | |
| Michael van Gerwen | Second round | 2 | 23 | 25 | 9 | 64 | 29 | 8 | 112 | 90.68 | |
| Peter Manley | Second round | 2 | 16 | 17 | 5 | 48 | 20 | 8 | 156 | 90.03 | |
| John Part | Second round | 2 | 17 | 16 | 6 | 26 | 24 | 7 | 120 | 87.75 | |
| Tony Eccles | Second round | 2 | 13 | 21 | 4 | 54 | 11 | 4 | 157 | 86.78 | |
| Kevin Painter | First round | 1 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 26 | 10 | 2 | 76 | 86.57 | |
| Adrian Gray | First round | 1 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 23 | 7 | 3 | 81 | 84.63 | |
| Andy Smith | First round | 1 | 4 | 10 | 1 | 22 | 5 | 2 | 80 | 84.45 | |
| Mark Frost | First round | 1 | 9 | 11 | 5 | 29 | 13 | 2 | 102 | 82.17 | |
| Steve Beaton | First round | 1 | 6 | 10 | 0 | 19 | 14 | 4 | 152 | 97.91 | |
| Adrian Lewis | First round | 1 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 17 | 14 | 4 | 116 | 88.75 | |
| Mark Dudbridge | First round | 1 | 9 | 11 | 2 | 23 | 18 | 5 | 160 | 88.28 | |
| Andy Hamilton | First round | 1 | 12 | 14 | 5 | 35 | 18 | 4 | 140 | 92.59 | |
| Vincent van der Voort | First round | 1 | 8 | 10 | 3 | 18 | 15 | 5 | 96 | 92.25 | |
| Mervyn King | First round | 1 | 7 | 10 | 1 | 22 | 13 | 1 | 116 | 91.49 | |
| Colin Lloyd | First round | 1 | 6 | 10 | 2 | 22 | 5 | 2 | 127 | 91.37 | |
| Alex Roy | First round | 1 | 6 | 10 | 3 | 27 | 13 | 2 | 116 | 91.32 | |
| Wayne Jones | First round | 1 | 4 | 10 | 1 | 18 | 12 | 1 | 116 | 91.04 | |
| Denis Ovens | First round | 1 | 4 | 10 | 1 | 22 | 10 | 3 | 110 | 90.59 | |
| Roland Scholten | First round | 1 | 4 | 10 | 0 | 17 | 6 | 1 | 74 | 90.56 | |
| Chris Mason | First round | 1 | 3 | 10 | 1 | 26 | 3 | 0 | 115 | 81.97 |