The first day of action in the Grand Slam of Darts sees all eight groups beginning over the course of the two sessions of play inside the Ricoh Arena in Coventry as the annual PDC and BDO jamboree gets up and running.
That means that we get to see all 32 players taking to the stage for the first time including the likes of Michael van Gerwen, Peter Wright and the man looking for a hat trick of titles this week in the recent World Cup winner Gerwyn Price.
Afternoon Session
We begin with the opening matches in Group D where Rob Cross has the honour of starting the tournament when he goes up against Justin Pipe before arguably the two most likely qualifiers from the section meet when Dave Chisnall takes on Luke Humphries. Two quality operators meet in the third match of the afternoon as James Wade battles it out with Damon Heta before the second Australian player in the field Simon Whitlock takes us to the halfway mark of the afternoon when he plays Ryan Searle.
We move back to Group F to start the second half of the afternoon as Glen Durrant goes up against the in form Dutch ace Jermaine Wattimena before the two Group H matches take to the stage. Firstly the Premier League finalist Nathan Aspinall faces the BDO world champion Wayne Warren and then the World Matchplay winner Dimitri Van den Bergh takes on Ricky Evans. The afternoon concludes with the former champion Gary Anderson in action. He goes up against the young Czech star Adam Gawlas.
Evening Session
The evening session starts out in Group G where Jonny Clayton will look to build on the success he had in winning the World Cup last weekend when he meets Ryan Joyce before a couple of cracking looking matches are on show. Joe Cullen will be looking to build on his Winter Series win on Saturday when he takes on Gabriel Clemens and then two of the best from the continent collide when Krzysztof Ratajski meets Jose de Sousa. The halfway mark will be reached with the back to form Michael Smith facing the Ladies Series winner Lisa Ashton.
The world number one Michael van Gerwen starts things off in the second half of the evening session. He takes on Adam Hunt who has shown some good form over the last couple of weeks. The defending champion Gerwyn Price then gets his title defence up and running when he goes up against the Women’s world champion Mikuru Suzuki. The PDC world champion is on stage in the penultimate match of the night when Peter Wright faces the World Grand Prix finalist Dirk van Duijvenbode before Ian White goes up against Devon Petersen to round off what should be a great day of darts.
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Betting
There are three bets that I like on the opening day. The first of them comes in the form of Damon Heta who showed what he has got at the Winter Series last week when he made it to the final of one of the events. He goes up against James Wade who himself hasn’t been in bad touch in recent times but who you always feel is vulnerable these days because his scoring power isn’t up there with the best players in the world. He’ll finish well and over a longer period that will be important but this is only a race to five which might well suit the Australian who spent last weekend playing the best of seven in the World Cup. Heta scores well and generally finishes well and he’s in decent touch and at even money can hopefully get us off to a winning start.
Since he won the Premier League, Glen Durrant has gone a little quiet. He had to stand down for a while due to a positive Covid test which might have something to do with it and he looks a little vulnerable against a Jermaine Wattimena who was in excellent form at the Winter Series last week. Durrant has struggled in the group stage of this competition in the past and although you’d expect him to be a contender to qualify he’ll need to find his best in order to do so. Wattimena doesn’t have a whole lot to lose here. He wasn’t in the field until Saturday night when his Winter Series tally got him in so he can play with a bit of freedom and looks overpriced to cause an upset in this encounter.
Finally deep into the evening session I can’t ignore the form of Devon Petersen and as long as he hits his doubles at an acceptable level I expect him to get the better of Ian White. White has a terrible record in this tournament, only coming out of the group stage once in five attempts and he only did that on leg difference in a pretty ordinary group. Petersen has come on leaps and bounds this year and is scoring as well as anyone on the circuit right now. Petersen has won four of the last five meetings between these two and can add another to his ledger here.
Tips
Back D.Heta to beat J.Wade for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Bet365
WON – Back J.Wattimena to beat G.Durrant for a 3/10 stake at 2.63 with Betfair
Back him here:
WON – Back D.Petersen to beat I.White for a 3/10 stake at 1.75 with 888sport
Back him here:
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