first round 3–0 defeat of Michael Smith. In a match that lasted only 18 minutes he averaged 108.31 as he never looked in danger of exiting the tournament at the first hurdle for the second successive year. He beat Brendan Dolan 4–1, Gary Anderson 4–0 and Simon Whitlock 5–1 to reach the semi-finals where he faced Phil Taylor. Before the match Van Barneveld commented that he wasn't scared of Taylor and wanted to face him rather than Taylor's quarter-final opponent Andy Hamilton. Van Barneveld was 5–1 down in the match and almost staged a fightback as he won three successive sets to trail only 5–4. However, Taylor won the next set by three legs to one to take the match. The pair were involved in an angry confrontation after the match. Taylor reacted angrily when Van Barneveld pulled him back after their handshake, with both men being escorted away separately by security staff. Van Barneveld stated later that he was only trying to congratulate Taylor in a sportsmanlike way and give him a hug. Taylor apologised for his behaviour a day later. In his third World Cup of Darts and first with Michael van Gerwen, the Dutch pair suffered a shock in the last 16 when they were beaten 5–3 by the Finnish duo of Jani Haavisto and Jarkko Komula. Van Barneveld was never out of the top four in the Premier League during all 14 weeks of the league phase. He won 10 out of his 16 games to finish second in the table which set up a semi-final meeting with Taylor against whom he had lost 7–3 and drawn with 6–6 in their two league clashes. From level at 3–3 in the semi-final, Taylor stormed away to win 8–4 to deny Van Barneveld his first Premier League final. Van Barneveld reached the final of the non-ranking Dubai Masters thanks to 10–6 and 11–5 wins over Adrian Lewis and James Wade. He faced Van Gerwen and was beaten 7–11. Van Barneveld defeated defending champion Robert Thornton in the last 16 of the 2013 UK Open and survived one match dart from Ronnie Baxter in the quarter-finals to win 10–9. His semi-final against Andy Hamilton went into a last leg decider, with Van Barneveld missing a total of six darts for the match to lose 10–9. He lost in the second round of the European Championship and World Matchplay to