Mike De Decker suffered a painful early exit at the Belgian Darts Open in Wieze, losing 6-5 to Niels Zonneveld in the first round despite leading 5-3. The defeat was a heavy blow for De Decker, who reached the final at the event last year, and it came in front of his home crowd during a weekend where fellow Belgians Kim Huybrechts reached the last 16 and Andy Baetens made the quarterfinals.
Speaking to Het Nieuwsblad after the match, De Decker expressed frustration with his performance. "Yeah, it's sh*t, isn't it," he said. "You're 5-3 up, you've got the match in hand and then you still give it away. Yeah, stupid. I didn't even get a match dart. I land on 32 twice, but both times a visit too late. Otherwise I do get a chance. Especially that leg at 5-4, I start with 180, but then 57 and 44... Yeah, that shouldn't happen. Man, man, man. If I just throw 100 twice there, I close out the match. Yeah, sh*t. Maybe Wieze just came a couple of weeks too early, but fine."
De Decker emphasized he is in a process to improve, noting, "You can't expect to be back at the 2024 level in one, two, three. I'm practicing quite a lot and I've also sought professional help. So hopefully it'll come good soon and we'll get that level back quickly. I know this is part of it, that it's a process. It's not nice to lose here, in your own country. But if I had lost like this in Munich in two weeks, it would have been stupid too. I'm not happy, of course not, but I'm not going to mope now. I've had those periods and I'm focusing on my hard work, then it will come."
The early defeat had serious consequences, as De Decker missed out by £250 on direct qualification for the European Tour events in Sindelfingen and Graz. As a result, at the start of April he will have to play the European Tour qualifiers again for the first time in a long while to secure a spot, with only 10 places available. Reflecting on this, De Decker said, "I'm not really looking forward to that. But it's part of it. Last year wasn't good enough and now I only managed to win one match, so. Then you don't deserve it. Maybe those qualifiers can give me a boost."
