semi-finals of the 1987 Belgian Open and reaching the semi-finals in the 1988 Dutch Open. In September 1990 he participated in the WDF Europe Cup singles where he lost in the quarter-finals to Phil Taylor. 1991–1997: First World final Van Barneveld's World Championship debut was at the 1991 Embassy World Championship at the Lakeside Country Club. His debut at the World Championship however was short-lived as he was comfortably beaten 3–0 by Keith Sullivan of Australia. He started to make some progress on the British Darts Organisation circuit in the early 1990s, reaching the quarter-finals of the Belgian Open in September 1990 and the German Open in March 1991. His first semi-final came at the Swiss Open in June 1991. He failed to qualify for the World Championship in 1992, but returned to Lakeside in 1993, which would be the last time that a unified World Championship would be staged. Van Barneveld served notice of his potential when he hit a 170 checkout to go 2 sets to 1 in front against John Lowe during their second-round match, but Lowe eventually won the match 3–2. Lowe went on to win the 1993 World Championship. Shortly after the 1993 World Final, the top players in the World Darts Council (WDC, now the PDC) were suspended and later banned from BDO tournaments. Van Barneveld continued to make progress in the BDO Open events in 1994 after the split. Despite failing to qualify for the 1994 BDO World Championship, he reached the quarter-finals of both Dutch Open and Berlin Open, the semi-final at the Belgium Open and his first and only final in a major in 1994, at the Finnish Open where he lost to Andy Fordham. He continued his good run of form into the 1995 World Championship by beating Les Wallace, Dave Askew, Colin Monk and Martin Adams to reach his first World Final. Van Barneveld's run to the final would eventually come to an end as he was defeated 6–3 by Welshman Richie Burnett. 1998–2006: Four World titles After second round exits in 1996 and 1997 Championships, Van Barneveld claimed his first world title in the 1998 World Championship in a World Final grudge match meeting against Richie Burnett. This time Van Barneveld was the victor, edging Burnett 6–5 in a game which is often considered to be one of the greatest finals of all time having reached 5–5 in