The first round of the World Grand Prix concludes inside the Citywest Hotel in Dublin on Monday night when those in the bottom half of the draw play down to the last 16 stage of the competition.
As is often the case in this tournament shocks came freely on the opening evening of play on Sunday. That was to be expected but was not expected was one of those shocks seeing the defending champion Michael van Gerwen being dumped out at the first stage. With Adrian Lewis also a casualty on the first night and Gary Anderson pulling out of the tournament all of a sudden this event is wide open.
Just like with Sunday’s play I’ll go through the matches in a bunch rather than individually as we are still at the best of three sets and bets and analysis is not easy to come across.
First four matches
The second night of play gets underway with an all-European battle between Benito van de Pas and Cristo Reyes. Former finalist Mervyn King is next onto the stage when he takes on a Ronny Huybrechts who will be looking to do better than his brother managed on Sunday. Steve West then takes on the twice champion James Wade before Simon Whitlock meets the ex-Lakeside champion Christian Kist.
Last four matches
Our tournament outright pick Mensur Suljovic is in action in the fifth match of the evening. He faces Ian White before Michael Smith goes up against the perfectly capable and dangerous Gerwyn Price. Mark Webster is the man who has benefitted from Gary Anderson’s withdrawal and he takes on Richard North in the penultimate match of the night before the game of the evening concludes things when Peter Wright meets the finalist of Saturday’s tour event in Stephen Bunting.
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Betting
There is just the one bet which interests me over the course of Monday evening. I was tempted by Stephen Bunting but his record against Wright is not the best. In fairness Steve West doesn’t have a great record against James Wade but I’m prepared to overlook that.
Wade is in pretty ordinary form this year. He has only been past the last 16 twice in regular tour events all year and for someone with his talent that is not good enough. He has a good record here but he is not hitting doubles the way he used to at the minute and he could be ripe for a big upset here.
West produced a seismic shock here last year when he dumped Taylor out in the first round and he showed that was no fluke when he best Michael Smith at the World Matchplay earlier in the year. West is likely to outscore Wade in this match and if tops is as kind to him here as it was 12 months ago the 17/10 on the Essex man is too big.
Tips
WON – Back S.West to beat J.Wade for a 4/10 stake at 2.70 with Boylesports
Back him here:
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