The quarter finals of the World Matchplay get going on Thursday evening when the top half of the draw determines its semi-finalists on what should be a night of exciting arrers inside the Winter Gardens in Blackpool.
This part of the draw has seen a number of shocks with the likes of Michael van Gerwen, Michael Smith, Daryl Gurney and Raymond Barneveld all dumped out albeit the latter was expected to lose to Gary Anderson.
Jeffrey de Zwaan vs Dave Chisnall
The opening quarter final sees the giant slayer Jeffrey de Zwaan taking on a Dave Chisnall who must be relied that he isn’t facing Michael van Gerwen in a major quarter final for once as his ranking as always seen him run into the Green Machine at this stage of a tournament.
De Zwaan has been on a dream run so far in the tournament. He took care of Michael van Gerwen in ruthless fashion and overcame the mind games against Adrian Lewis to fly past him. Dave Chisnall has done well to be here but we shouldn’t forget that Keegan Brown never turned up against him and Michael Smith folded like a cheap suit, admittedly in the face of a wave of power scoring from Chizzy.
I think this is the first opponent that Chisnall will face who is unlikely to go away. I always think Chisnall is an uneasy favourite and we know that de Zwaan has no problem raising his game against the bigger names. If anything in his matches thus far he has got better the longer the matches have gone on so that makes me think over 27.5 legs is a strong possibility.
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Joe Cullen vs Gary Anderson
The second match of the evening sees Joe Cullen look to take another scalp when he faces the new tournament favourite Gary Anderson over the best of 31 legs for a place in the semi-final on Saturday evening.
These two have met eight times in the past and to Cullen’s credit he is 4-4 with Anderson having won their last two meetings but they have never met over a distance of this kind. Anderson has looked very good in both of his matches and the longer he went against Barneveld the better he got. I’m not taking anything away from Cullen whatsoever but so far he’s beaten an injured Gerwyn Price and a Daryl Gurney who was so bad he needn’t have bothered showing up. It is hard to judge quite how well Cullen is playing.
One thing we do know is this will be Cullen’s toughest test so far and he’ll need his very best darts over a very long period to be competitive here. Anderson is used to performing to a high standard over this distance. His average was climbing after 20 legs against Barneveld and but for a slow start it would have been higher than it ended up. Cullen might live with Anderson early but the relentless leg on leg scoring pressure the Scot delivers will eventually see Cullen miss clutch doubles and fall behind in the latter stages. I think Anderson will cover 4.5 legs here.
Tips
Back J.de Zwaan vs D.Chisnall – Over 27.5 legs for a 4/10 stake at 1.80 with William Hill
Back it here:
Back G.Anderson (-4.5 legs) to beat J.Cullen for a 4/10 stake at 1.83 with BetBright
Back him here:
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