Ross Smith

Ross Smith, known as Smudger, is an English darts player and a three-time PDC major winner. Born in Dover on 12 January 1989 and still based there, he was sixth on the PDC Order of Merit when the rankings were last published on 2 November 2026, with £714,750 in ranking prize money over the two-year period the list covers. The PDC credits him with 13 senior titles, a total it compiles across all of its senior competitions. He won four PDC Challenge Tour titles in 2013, the most of any player that year.

His first PDC ranking title came at Players Championship 19 in 2021, where he beat Brendan Dolan 8-4 in the final. In 2022 he won the European Championship, his first PDC major title, beating Michael Smith 11-8 in the final. He added Players Championship titles in 2023, 2024 and 2025 and reached a peak ranking of ninth in 2024.

He lost 3-2 to Andreas Harrysson in the first round of the 2026 World Championship. He then won Players Championship 5, beating Chris Dobey 8-2, and his first European Tour title at the International Darts Open in May, beating Ryan Searle 8-3 in the final. He won Players Championship 20 in June and the Hungarian Darts Trophy in August, beating Gary Anderson 8-2 in the final. In September he won his second PDC major title at the World Series of Darts Finals, beating Gerwyn Price 11-5. After a 6-4 defeat to Searle at the Dutch Darts Championship, he beat Karel Sedlacek 6-4, Damon Heta 10-7, Luke Woodhouse 10-6 and Price 11-7 at the European Championship in Dortmund and then beat Martin Schindler 11-8 in the final on 25 October 2026 to win the European Championship for the second time. The PDC records eight nine-dart finishes for him in its senior events and nine across all of its events. He throws 22-gram Unicorn darts.