Barney’s unique hairdo has been turning heads among fans ahead of his latest World Championship bid
15:26, 17 Dec 2025
Raymond van Barneveld will take to the stage tonight against Switzerland’s Stefan Bellmont sporting a distinctive look(Image: (Photo by Joris Verwijst/BSR Agency/Getty Images))
Five-time world champion and crowd-pleaser Raymond van Barneveld is set to grace the Alexandra Palace main stage tonight (Wednesday, 17 December), launching his latest Paddy Power PDC World Darts Championship bid.
The Dutch darting legend will take on Switzerland’s Stefan Bellmont in the opening round at around 8pm, with Barney tipped by the bookies to breeze past the world No. 111.
While millions of viewers will be glued to the action on the Ally Pally stage, there’s no doubt that Van Barneveld’s distinctive barnet, or lack thereof, will also be drawing plenty of attention from fans watching along on social media.
Raymond van Barneveld’s announcement surprised the darting world(Image: Getty)
Despite besting many of the sport’s top dogs, including sixteen-time World Championship winner Phil Taylor, the 58-year-old has been grappling with a problem that plagues many a middle-aged man – thinning hair.
In a bid to tackle his receding hairline, Van Barneveld popped into a hair transplant clinic back home in the Netherlands. The darts star even had a bit of a laugh about his new ‘do, comparing it to a toy figure’s hair.
He quipped: “Always been a big fan of @playmboil with my ‘Playmobil Hair’. Thought I’d say it before someone else does!”
But Barney didn’t go for your run-of-the-mill hair transplant. Instead, he opted for a procedure with a company called Transhair, which involved tattooing stubble onto his head.
The result? A standout look that’s certainly turned heads among fans.
Transhair offers a useful guide to the procedure on their website. They clarify: “Raymond van Barneveld opted for the so-called MHP hair pigmentation treatment in our clinic. So actually it is not correct when we say ‘hair transplantation’, because MHP is a different type of treatment.
“With this technique we tattoo stubble on the scalp. This way you create a shaven look, as it were. This treatment is perfect for anyone who has short, shaved hair and where baldness has already progressed.
“With this innovate MHP technique – also called stubble tattoo – small stubbles are imitated, so that it appears as if the head has been shaved. The result looks very natural. Our Micro Hair Pigmentation treatments are carried out by Clinic4Hair, a sister company of Transhair that has specialists with years of experience in this field.”
Barney will be hoping for a stronger performance at this year’s Worlds after the Dutchman was knocked out in the second round last year by Welshman Nick Kenny. Two years ago, the star from The Hague was eliminated in the fourth round following a 4-1 defeat to a certain Luke Littler, then aged just 16.
A former world No. 1, Van Barneveld clinched the world champion title four times on the BDO before switching to the rival PDC tour in 2007.
That year, he triumphed over arch-rival Taylor 7-6 in a final widely celebrated as one of the greatest darts matches of all time.
