The evening session in the PDC World Darts Championship on Thursday sees four more matches on the schedule and another eight players back in action looking to make progress in the tournament inside the behind closed doors setup at Alexandra Palace in London.
The stars are slowly but surely beginning to come out to play and on Thursday evening the Grand Slam of Darts winner Jose de Sousa headlines a card that includes a number of promising players throughout its duration.
Luke Woodhouse vs Jamie Lewis
One of the pick of the matches in the first round of the competition is the first one up on Thursday evening when Luke Woodhouse takes on the former semi-finalist Jamie Lewis with the winner facing Gerwyn Price in the second round.
It is three years ago that Lewis ploughed in 180 after 180 in this event and made it through to the final four but he has never really kicked on from there and of course recently we found out why when he admitted having anxiety issues on social media. Woodhouse went well on debut here last year when he took care of Michael Smith in the second round and since then made a name for himself with that nine darter in his kitchen in the PDC Home Tour. This one could go either way and while I’d give Woodhouse the edge it is with no strength of feeling to merit a bet here.
Ron Meulenkamp vs Boris Krcmar
The second match of the night is set to be the closest one as far as the bookmakers are concerned as two European players collide when the experienced Dutch ace Ron Meulenkamp takes on Boris Krcmar for the right to meet Vincent van der Voort in the next round.
Meulenkamp has become a regular in this tournament but he rarely offers much in the way of deep runs and is what I often refer to as a plodder or a one-paced player. He is consistent but does nothing too special and if someone scores strongly against him or finishes well against him they usually beat him. Krcmar has really hit form in the last few months and almost took Michael Smith out of the Players Championship Finals with a 100+ average last month. He does have a win over him in a Players Championship event as well as wins over Dave Chisnall, Kim Huybrechts, Krzysztof Ratajski and Gabriel Clemens among others. That is top level form in my eyes and he should be taken to overcome his big stage inexperience to win this.
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Ryan Searle vs Dan Lauby
The last of the first round matches in the evening sees a Ryan Searle who almost made it automatically into the second round of the tournament taking on the American qualifier Dan Lauby for the right to face Jeffrey de Zwaan in the last 64.
Lauby is relatively inexperienced at the top level with the only previous time he has been on our screens on his own was in the US Darts Masters a few years ago. He did play in the World Cup recently but didn’t look up to much on either occasion so I’m pretty confident that Searle will win the match. I think he has an insane scoring power which should give him a lot of chances to hit the double so I think the best bet in this one is to take Searle to complete the match treble where the 11/10 is likely to be that price on him to hit the highest checkout, something which has to be likely with the American unlikely to win many legs.
Jose de Sousa vs Ross Smith
The final match of the night is once again the only second round match on the evening when the Grand Slam of Darts champion Jose de Sousa takes on an underrated but in form Englishman in Ross Smith with the reward of being in the tournament after Christmas the prize for the winner.
This will be the third time de Sousa has been to this event but he hasn’t won a match here yet. Clearly he is a much different animal this time round though which is significant but we’ve seen better and stronger players than him struggle to perform here so until a player gets that first win under their belt at a tournament like this you just never know. Smith came past David Evans with a good performance on Wednesday and a repeat of that with a little bit on top would have him very dangerous here. Unlike on Wednesday, Smith doesn’t have a whole lot to lose in this one so hopefully this will be a cracker but there isn’t anything I fancy in terms of a bet.
Tips
Back B.Krcmar to beat R.Meulenkamp for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
Back R.Searle to win, hit most 180s and highest checkout vs D.Lauby for a 3/10 stake at 2.10 with Coral
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