5–3 and Simon Whitlock 5–0 before losing 6–2 against van Barneveld in the final. The following year, he reached the semi-finals, and again was beaten 6–2 by van Barneveld. In the BDO's second biggest major, the Winmau World Masters, it was a similar story. Adams reached four semi-finals, losing to Steve Beaton in 1994, Erik Clarys in 1995, Les Wallace in 1998 and van Barneveld in 2005. In 2006, Adams reached his first Masters final, where he lost to 7–5 to 17-year-old Michael van Gerwen, having led 5–2 in sets and despite averaging 107 for the first nine darts of each leg. Adams has won many BDO Open events and twice won the WDF World Cup singles. In the Grand Slam BDO events, other than the World Championship, Adams was beaten 6–4 in the 2004 Bavaria World Darts Trophy final by Raymond van Barneveld and lost the 2006 Bavaria World Darts Trophy final to Phil Taylor 7–2. Adams reached the semi-finals of the revived News of the World Darts Championship in 1997, where he lost 2-1 to Phil Taylor. 2007 Adams reached his second world final in 2007. He was number one seed for the second time in his career and put out Tony O'Shea, Co Stompé, Ted Hankey and Mervyn King in his run to the final where he faced qualifier Phil Nixon. The two oldest players in the tournament (they were both 50 years old) reached the final. Adams stormed into a 6–0 lead, before Nixon produced an incredible comeback to level the match. Just when it looked like Adams was heading for another dramatic defeat, having already missed four match darts, he went on to win all three legs in the final set to take the match 7–6 and finally claim the world title that he said he had been chasing for 14 years. 2008 In the draw for the 2008 BDO World Championships, Adams was again paired with Nixon in the first round. In the match, Adams beat Nixon 3–0. After the game, Adams was clearly emotional in an interview following his victory, citing the memories of the 2007 final as the reason (the first time he had won comfortably). In the second round he came up against Martin Phillips. It was easy pickings for Adams, who cruised to a 4–0 victory with Phillips paying the price for many missed doubles. In the quarter-finals he played