Competitive fayre has been the order of the day for much of the PDC World Darts Championship thus far, and that looks like it will continue on Friday evening when four more second round matches fill up the Alexandra Palace schedule.
The former finalist Peter Wright headlines the card but we also get to see the beaten semi-finalist of a year ago in Nathan Aspinall and a host of up and coming stars on what should be a really good evening of arrers in London.
Nathan Aspinall vs Danny Baggish
We begin with the man who sent shockwaves through the tournament last year in Nathan Aspinall who goes up against the American qualifier Danny Baggish, who has already overcome the threat of Andy Boulton in the first round.
Aspinall will know only too well what can happen when a qualifier is underestimated at this stage so we can be pretty sure that he won’t be taking his American foe lightly here. Aspinall has kicked on since he made the last four here last year, winning the UK Open and the Vegas leg of the World Series and he arrives here as a dark horse. Baggish was competitive in a third tier type contest in the first round but unless he improves a lot I expect Aspinall to take this down, albeit there is no real value in backing the Stockport ace.
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Joe Cullen vs Nico Kurz
In a lot of ways the second match of the night could be the most intriguing as Joe Cullen faces Nico Kurz, a man who has already seen off one Yorkshireman this week and is looking to complete a quick double over men from that part of the world.
Cullen has one of the worst records you will find on this stage. This will be the tenth year he has set foot on the stage and only once has he been victorious, losing in eight of his previous nine first round matches and only winning three sets in the last seven of those losing efforts. Whether it is the venue itself or the set format, something certainly doesn’t agree with him here.
Kurz seemed to love the venue earlier in the week and has a taste for the big stage after taking care of Gary Anderson in the German Darts Masters, before running Peter Wright close in the quarter final. He scored well against James Wilson in the first round and finished strongly and could kick on again. Cullen can’t be feeling good about things here and he looks vulnerable to a man who might not have peaked yet.
Max Hopp vs Benito van de Pas
The Germans keep on coming on Friday night as Max Hopp follows his countryman onto the stage when he meets a Benito van de Pas who is producing something of a second coming in his career, just when he needed it the most.
Such has been the struggles of the Dutchman, he has dropped to number 59 in the world having been a regular in the top 16 as recently as a couple of seasons ago. His first round win was therefore much needed and he should be able to play with a little more freedom and keep producing better things. He might well feel he has a good chance here too because the form of Hopp has fallen off a cliff since the World Cup back in June. It might be that the big stage inspires the German though. It will certainly need to but I’m not going to rule that possibility out. This looks like a competitive battle where a deciding set wouldn’t be a surprise. I’ll sit out having a bet though.
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Peter Wright vs Noel Malicdem
Peter Wright begins another quest for an elusive world title in the final match of the night on Friday, and it starts out against the Philippines’ star Noel Malicdem, who eased past a disappointing Rowby-John Rodriguez in his opening match.
There wasn’t a huge amount that was special about Malicdem in that first round but just like last year he got the job done and lives to have a crack at one of the big boys. That happened here last year when he went up against Kyle Anderson in this round but was found out a little, and you would expect that to be the case here if Wright is anywhere near the top of his game. Wright’s scoring consistency leg on leg is likely to be too much here and I expect him to breeze through. That isn’t really necessarily how it has all played out this week so far though so rather than risking Wright winning 3-0 I’ll sit and watch and see if he is indeed good enough to do so.
Tips
WON – Back N.Kurz to beat J.Cullen for a 4/10 stake at 2.60 with Coral
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