The first block of matches in the Premier League Darts season continues on Wednesday evening when the 10 participants are back on the stage at the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes looking for points to stave off the threat of elimination.
We’ve seen some great darts over the first two nights of the campaign and we’ve had some indifferent stuff mixed in but with all 10 players now fully up to speed, we should see the consistency and quality rise.
Rob Cross vs Michael van Gerwen
It isn’t very often that Michael van Gerwen opens the show but that might be a sign of the times as that is the case on Wednesday evening. He takes on the former world champion Rob Cross, who has shown much improved form thus far this season.
Cross has come away from his first two matches with three points, the same as MVG, so whoever comes out on top here will lead the way for a short while at the very least. Both men drew with an opponent in good form and then took advantage of one who wasn’t playing their best stuff against them. My gut impression is that this will be a tighter match than the odds on quotes for van Gerwen would suggest but it isn’t really a match I’m queuing up to get involved in.
Glen Durrant vs Dimitri Van den Bergh
The second match of the evening sees the defending champion Glen Durrant looking to get himself back on track after two poor displays to begin with when he takes on the World Matchplay champion Dimitri Van den Bergh.
Durrant has been little short of awful in this tournament so far and even after two matches you kind of fear for him. With three more matches to play this week if he doesn’t find something soon he could be marooned at the bottom of the pile. He is going to be up against it here too against a Van den Bergh who has already held Michael van Gerwen and beaten Nathan Aspinall. His averages have been sublime despite a raft of missed doubles and if anything is going to give Duzza a chance here it will be that inability to polish legs off quickly. In saying that though his scoring power is likely to create a lot of chances. Interestingly, Durrant has only hit one 180 so far whereas Van den Bergh has eight. Despite his inability to hit doubles quickly, Van den Bergh averages 13 points for than Durrant for the tournament. Those statistics tell us that DVDB to win and hit the most 180s should reward us here.
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Peter Wright vs Gary Anderson
The middle match of the evening is the all-Scottish clash between two form world champions when Peter Wright takes on Gary Anderson in a match both will want to win but perhaps one Wright needs to win more than his opponent.
Wright comes into this match off the back of a terrible performance against van Gerwen on Tuesday evening and another of those will have him once again fighting hard to avoid the drop just as he was for periods of last season. Anderson has been going well so far and has three points to his name. There is the argument that he was fortunate for de Sousa to miss doubles in the last leg to let him in to win but you have to be there to take advantage of the opportunity. Anderson still isn’t tight on his doubles though which makes me think if he is over his bad night then Wright could well rebound with a win here but that is total guesswork and I don’t like to get involved in that.
Nathan Aspinall vs James Wade
Two men who lost on Tuesday evening will compete in the penultimate match of the night when the beaten finalist of last year, Nathan Aspinall, meets the most recent tournament winner in James Wade in what is now a big match for both players.
Aspinall does have the advantage of having won his first match though so he is in a better position of the two, and in the main he has played well in both his matches far whereas Wade was good in the opening match and unlucky not to win and then worse than ordinary in the second game against Rob Cross on Tuesday. If the Wade of the first game shows up here we should have a decent match but if it is the one from Tuesday you would think Aspinall will win and win well. Again it is all guessing and that isn’t a good foundation for a bet.
Jose de Sousa vs Jonny Clayton
The final match of the night sees two men who opened their TV title account over the last 12 months battling it out for more points when the Grand Slam champion Jose de Sousa meets The Masters winner Jonny Clayton.
These two players are at different ends of the table after draws in their opening match whereas de Sousa lost on Tuesday night while Clayton saw off Glen Durrant but I don’t think he saw him off as emphatically as was expected or as he could have done at one point and that would be a concern to me. In fact, both players have struggled to get over the line in matches this week as de Sousa failed to polish off a 6-4 lead in his first game and missed doubles in the last leg to secure a draw on Tuesday. That makes me think this one could go all the way but I don’t really want to be relying on missed doubles to get us there so I’ll leave this one alone.
Tips
WON – Back D.Van den Bergh to win and most 180s vs G.Durrant for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Betway
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