Michael van Gerwen returns to the World Darts Championship stage on Saturday evening.

The three-time champion takes on Chas Barstow in his second round match and he'll no doubt put on a show for the raucous Ally Pally crowd.

Van Gerwen has produced some iconic moments on the most prestigious oche of them all down the years, with perhaps the best of the lot coming in the 2013 edition of the tournament.

Even as far back as nine years ago, the Dutchman was on his way to legendary status and he came agonisingly close to pulling off the seemingly impossible.

Van Gerwen did battle with James Wade in the semi-finals of the 2013 World Championship and in the fifth set of their encounter, viewers were treated to something very, very special.

The man who's currently ranked number three in the world performed a magical nine-darter, hitting 180 and 177 before finishing with a beautiful 144.

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But that wasn't it. After achieving darts' equivalent of a 147 break, Van Gerwen continued to fire his trusty tungsten into the treble beds, hitting two more maximums to leave 141.

The Green Machine then made it 17 perfect darts to leave himself on the brink of consecutive nine-darters. Sadly, he fell agonisingly short on the double 12.

Nevertheless, it remains one of the greatest and craziest moments ever seen in professional sport and you can relive Van Gerwen's unrivalled darting magic in the video below.

Video: Van Gerwen's 17 perfect darts vs Wade

We may never see anything quite like it again.

The odds of hitting 17 perfect darts on the biggest stage of all are absolutely miniscule and it's more than likely that most professional players fail to even pull it off on the practice board.

Van Gerwen went on to beat Wade 6-4 in the semi-final, which set up a date with the legendary Phil Taylor in the finale of the 2013 tournament.

Van Gerwen in action

The Power prevailed 7-4 in the match, but Van Gerwen finally got his hands on the biggest trophy in darts the following year, beating Peter Wright by the same scoreline he'd lost to Taylor by.

Can the Dutchman make it World Championship number four in the 2022 edition? He's certainly got a huge chance, although it's mighty hard to look past Gerwyn Price right now...