After 15 long weeks touring the UK, Ireland and mainland Europe we have reached finals night in the Premier League Darts event. Four men head to the o2 on Thursday night looking to secure the exhibition tournament trophy and a bumper first prize.
Both semi-finals kick the evening off over the best of 19 legs before we get to the final immediately after which will be decided over the best of 21. We have four world class stars on show on what is guaranteed to be an amazing night of darts.
Michael van Gerwen vs Rob Cross
The first semi-final of the tournament sees the table topping Michael van Gerwen taking on the man who finishing fourth in the shape of the world champion Rob Cross. Van Gerwen won both their meetings in the regular season and currently leads the head-to-head between the two 10-2.
One of those wins that Cross achieved was in arguably their biggest match to date which was that epic World Championship semi-final but even then van Gerwen blew more than enough chances to win that match. Cross will need to be at his very best to contain the Dutchman here as he bids to defend the title he won 12 months ago.
It might be tough for Cross to be at his best. He pulled out of the European Tour event last weekend through injury/illness and hasn’t had much time to recover. Even if he is at his best there is every chance he loses here but if he isn’t he could be well beaten. Either way I think MVG will want to win this and win it big after what happened at Ally Pally. He can cover 3.5 legs.
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Michael Smith vs Gary Anderson
The second semi-final is the battle of the stablemates as Michael Smith takes on his mentor Gary Anderson for a place in the final. Smith finished second in the table while Anderson saw off MVG in the final match of the regular season to steal third place.
Anderson should go into this match full of confidence given that he holds a 9-3 lead over Smith in their career record and that would have been 10-2 if his back injury hadn’t flared up when he was about to see off his young foe on the opening night of the Premier League campaign.
Anderson was 5-1 up that night and if he had gone on and won he would have seven straight wins over Smith and in truth the Englishman hasn’t been close in any of those matches. To make matters worse for Smith he looked full of illness last week and if that is lingering here he could struggle. Anderson knows how to peak for the o2 and I expect him to be too good here.
Tips
WON – Back M.van Gerwen (-3.5 legs) to beat R.Cross for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with William Hill
Back him here:
Back G.Anderson (-2.5 legs) to beat M.Smith for a 5/10 stake at 1.85 with NetBet
Back him here:
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