CROSS KEYS rugby star Gerwyn Price impressed on his debut at the PDC World Championship, but was blown away by a ruthless Peter Wright.

The colourful Scotsman is the world ranked number five and was a beaten finalist last year, and he held his nerve in the key moments despite a superb showing from rookie Price.

The Cross Keys star featured for the Premiership side in the Swalec Cup final this season and also had a brief spell with Glasgow in the Pro12.

However, Price has committed fully to the darts after impressing in European events and qualified for this debut - live on Sky Sports - and more than held his own, chalking up five 180 maximums despite failing to win a set.

Price lost the first set 3-1 as Wright's efficiency on the doubles allowed him to break the throw before the Scotsman held his nerve superbly to win the deciding legs in the second and third sets to ease in the second round.

Price has only in the last few months opted to go full time as a professional and can take a lot from his experience, he never looked overawed and will consider himself unlucky not to have won at least a set.

Phil Taylor put personal troubles aside as he cruised through.

Taylor's mother has been seriously ill and the 16-time world champion was noticeably subdued during a comprehensive 3-0 victory over Germany's Jyhan Artut.

Artut did not win a leg until the third set, and he delayed Taylor's victory by breaking the throw to make it 2-2, but the 54-year-old responded in kind to clinch victory.

Taylor said afterwards he had been unsettled by Artut complaining throughout that the board was not straight.

Assessing his performance on Sky Sports, the second seed said: "Not brilliant. Bit lazy, bit slack. He kept complaining about the board. I looked at the board, it was level. It did put me off and maybe that was his game plan."

The opening match of the night nearly produced an upset but 12th seed Andy Hamilton edged past Dave Richardson 3-2.

Richardson won successive legs to lead 2-1 but Hamilton hit back to book his place in round two.

There was a shock in the final encounter of the evening as 13th seed Wes Newton lost in a dramatic last leg sudden death shootout to Cristo Reyes, who had qualified for the first round by beating Christian Perez 4-0 in the preliminary round earlier in the evening.

With the scores tied at 2-2 and 5-5 in sets and legs respectively, confusion reigned as Reyes threw for bull to determine who would throw first in the shootout, only to be told that he had to play on.

Midway through the shootout, though, it was realised a mistake had been made and the players began the leg again, with Reyes holding his nerve to seal a surprise win but leave Newton thoroughly unimpressed.