Royden Lam kicked off the defence of his Soft Darts World Championship title by winning Stage One in Malaysia on Sunday.

Last year’s Grand Final winner defeated Croatia’s Boris Krcmar in the final, winning three straight games (one leg of 701 followed by two games of cricket) to pick up the title at the Avenue Garden Hotel.

Lam, 43, who appeared at the PDC World Championship at the end of last year, but missed out on a tour card at Q-School in January, has been in good form on the PDC Asian Tour this season, winning a title and reaching another final.

But it was back to soft tip for Lam this weekend, as the new Soft Darts World Championship campaign got under way in Malaysia, and after coming through the round-robin phase, he defeated Eric Lim, Diogo Cheong, Sho Katsumi, Adam Bryant, Leonard Gates and Jose Justicia to progress to the final.

Meanwhile, Krcmar, who finished top of the 2018 Annual Ranking and lost to Lam in the final of the Grand Final last year, got the better of Chao Chuang Lee, Yoshihisa Baba, Man Fong Lei, Tony Martin, David Fatum and Pupo Teng Lieh in the knockout stages.

Reigning BDO ladies world champion Mikuru Suzuki’s bid for the title ended in the last 64, losing to Yutaro Sato, while Lakeside finalist Scott Waites also bowed out at the same hurdle.

Picture: THE WORLD official