The opening day of the 2021 Players Championship Finals sees the first round of the tournament being completed down in Minehead on a Friday where there will be two sessions of play with spots in the second round at stake.
We have two boards in operation on the first day of the tournament and all 64 players will be on one of them over the two sessions so we should be in for an exciting and I dare say tense day of action with each match just the race to six.
Afternoon Session
Main Stage
Two men who are no stranger to the big stage open up the tournament on the main stage as Ryan Searle takes on Simon Whitlock before the Polish number one Krzysztof Ratajski takes on Ron Meulenkamp, who doesn’t qualify for many TV events these days but tends to have his best with him when he does. Michael Smith is our outright selection and he graces the stage in the third game when he takes on William Borland before Joe Cullen begins his quest for a first TV title when he takes on Andy Boulton. Dimitri Van den Bergh was forced out of the Grand Slam of Darts last week and he’ll be looking to make up for lost ground when he faces Madars Razma before James Wade goes up against Ricky Evans. Two other matches take place in the afternoon session. They see Nathan Aspinall taking on Jeff Smith and Adrian Lewis facing Kim Huybrechts.
Stage Two
The action on Stage Two begins with a former world champion on show when Scott Mitchell meets the big Dutch player Martijn Kleermaker before Ryan Joyce, who impressed at the Grand Slam of Darts recently, takes on Luke Woodhouse. Martin Schindler beat Gerwyn Price at the Grand Slam and he’ll be looking to take another big name scalp in Ian White while Mervyn King will start his campaign for that elusive PDC major when he meets Darius Labanauskas. Brendan Dolan is the man who starts the second half of the afternoon when he faces Chas Barstow before Ross Smith takes on the promising youngster Rusty-Jake Rodriguez. The Austrian’s brother Rowby-John Rodriguez follows him onto the stage to play Danny Noppert and the action concludes with Gabriel Clemens meeting Steve Beaton.
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Evening Session
Main Stage
Two former world champions step onto the stage to begin the evening session when Stephen Bunting takes on Gary Anderson before another to have climbed the summit of the sport is in action when Raymond van Barneveld faces his compatriot Maik Kuivenhoven. The world champions keep on coming throughout the evening with Rob Cross meeting Jermaine Wattimena in match three. The number one seed Jose de Sousa then meets Devon Peterson in what might be a high scoring contest. The current world champion Gerwyn Price is up fifth when he takes on Jason Lowe who started the year by upsetting Michael Smith in the World Championship. The final three matches sees Michael van Gerwen starting his title defence against Kevin Doets, Peter Wright looks to make progress against Keane Barry and Jonny Clayton faces Alan Tabern.
Stage Two
Two Dutch stars start up the action over on Stage Two in the evening session when Vincent van der Voort takes on Jelle Klaasen, who was a late entry into the tournament when Jamie Hughes withdrew. They are followed by Daryl Gurney taking on Alan Soutar who had a brilliant start to the season. Damon Heta has had a good Players Championship circuit and he’ll be looking to overcome Steve Lennon before two of the better youngsters look to showcase their talents. Callan Rydz meets Mensur Suljovic and Ryan Meikle faces Dirk van Duijvenbode. Luke Humphries has good memories of Minehead and he’ll be looking to build on them when he takes on Jason Heaver before the evening ends with Chris Dobey playing William O’Connor and Dave Chisnall facing Ritchie Edhouse.
Betting
I’ll take a couple of bets over the course of the day with the first of those closing out the afternoon session when Adrian Lewis meets Kim Huybrechts. Lewis at his best would probably be expected to win this but he isn’t at his best and he meets a Belgian who has come to life since the World Cup. Huybrechts is playing some real good darts at the minute and you would think because he’s had a few good results recently that he’ll be playing with less pressure on him than Lewis might be. One of these players is back on the rise while the other continues to struggle. I’ll take the improving Huybrechts here.
The other one I like is for Stephen Bunting to beat Gary Anderson. Anderson rarely cares about the floor events which is why he is ranked 42 in the order of merit for this event. I’m not sure he’ll be overly bothered about this tournament either and as I’ve said a few times these best of 11s don’t suit his game at all, especially if he starts missing doubles. Bunting will have been disappointed with his showing at the Grand Slam. He couldn’t do anything about his first loss to Ryan Joyce but he didn’t get any pressure on Rowby-John Rodriguez in his second defeat but the averages Bunting has been throwing in recent times tells us he is playing well and he’s value to see off a potentially disinterested Anderson who could pay the price for missed doubles.
Tips
Back K.Huybrechts to beat A.Lewis for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Betfair
Back him here:
Back S.Bunting to beat G.Anderson for a 3/10 stake at 2.10 with BetVictor
Back him here:
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