Hamilton – runner-up to Phil Taylor at last month’s Grand Slam of Darts - landed eight 180s to see off Kwaidjk and book his second round berth, and will now return to his Stoke home for the Christmas break and to have checks on the injury.

“I was going outside last night and I missed the top step, and slipped down the stairs,” he revealed.

“I’ll go back home and have an x-ray on it to get it checked out, but it didn’t affect my performance too much.

“Hopefully it’s only a sprained ankle!”

Number 16 seed Andy Jenkins narrowly avoided an upset after coming from 2-1 down to defeat Miloslav Navratil.

Czech qualifier Navratil, who won his preliminary round game against Rizal Barellano 5-0 yesterday, put in a spirited performance, which included five maximums before being out-gunned by Jenkins’ late surge of six straight legs.

Jenkins said: “I started to panic when he went 2-1 up. I thought I was going out but I kept fighting and eventually he broke.”

Elsewhere in the first round, Tony Eccles thrashed number 23 seed Wayne Jones 3-0, while 27th seed Alex Roy came from behind to beat Warren Parry 3-2.

Today’s preliminary round matches saw Chinese qualifier Shi Yongsheng set up a meeting with Alan Warriner-Little after thrashing Ashfaque Sayed 5-0, while Erwin Extercatte matched that performance against Alan Bolton, guaranteeing a clash with Colin Osborne.