The days are getting longer and the nights brighter, but Stephen Bunting still finds himself trapped in a dark place at the bottom of the Premier League table. During Thursday’s supplement in Nottingham, the Bullet did what every desperate player can’t afford to do… lose a must-win match.

After six consecutive weeks of losses, Bunting’s quarter-final clash against fellow basement dweller Chris Dobey appeared the perfect opportunity for the World Championship semi-finalist to get off the mark. Instead, he didn’t even come close, with Dobey – who also made the last four of the worlds – waltzing to a dominative 6-2 win.

Bunting went on to issue a public statement apologising for his performances on the big stage, but what if his performances point towards a bigger problem that might need fixing by the PDC?

As Bunting will attest to, it isn’t easy being up on that Premier League stage, week, after week, after week. And when you’re stuck in a rut, it can take a lot to get you out of it – just ask former world champion Peter Wright!

Claims Bunting isn’t good enough for the Premier League are nonsensical. Even though he’s lost seven on the spin, the Liverpudlian has still been averaging close to or over a ton in most of his matches. Bad players don’t do that. However, the league table doesn’t lie and based on his seven blanks so far this season, it’s fair to say the jump back up to the Premier League level has proved too much so far.

And even though he was the best of the rest non-Premier League players – the 39-year-old finished the Worlds fifth in the Order of Merit – Bunting getting pumped week after week isn’t a good look for the tournament’s organisers. Perhaps a little format change could prove the answer though.

There isn’t a shortage of Premier League quality players on the tour. Just go back to the Premier League announcement and the likes of Damon Heta, Mike De Decker and Dimitri Van den Bergh were all being spoken about as players who have ‘been snubbed’ for a spot in this year’s edition.

In a roundabout way, taking the number of participants back to 10, or even upping it to 12, could bring about an overall increase in the quality of the competition. It should, in theory, prevent there being a ‘whipping boy’, given there would be more opportunities for players to beat each other and the overall gap between top and bottom is likely to go down.

The only real consequence of that would be the removal of the tournament-style format each week, but is anyone actually convinced that it’s better than the old head-to-head setup anyway?