It is the penultimate day of the latest Icons of Darts league on Friday with two men set to battle it out for the overall honours ahead of the conclusion of the week on Saturday. That should build the foundations of a decent afternoon.
We would be lying if we said Thursday was anything but drab for the most part, but we have seen a nine dart finish this week and we have three men who have been competitive throughout, so we should see some decent darts again on Friday.
The Format
Each day from Monday to Saturday five men will battle it out in a round robin group with the overall champion being determined on Saturday May 2. Matches will see the players compete over the best of 9 legs with each of them at home in front of a webcam throwing at their own individual dartboards. Scores can be found on Dart Connect and the tournament will be streamed on the bookmaker live streaming consoles and for free on Dartslive.tv.
Here’s how the overall @reddragondarts Icons Live League table looks after Day Four ??? #IconsofDarts pic.twitter.com/GdBy34FtVV
— MODUS Sports (@ModusDarts180) April 23, 2020
Thursday Recap
Paul Nicholson came back into the fold on Thursday and picked up where he left off on Tuesday with four wins from four matches. He wasn’t always as good as he has been but you can’t argue with a 100% day. I mentioned in the preview that there was a good chance the match between Arron Monk and Nicholson early in the day could decide the group and that is what happened. Monk and James Hubbard picked up a pair of victories while it was a disappointing day for Adam Huckvale and Diogo Portela.
It was a bad day for us betting wise. Diogo Portela never really turned up all day but at no point was he as bad as he was in his opening match against Adam Huckvale, the game we took the Brazilian to win so it is the first day in three we have recorded a loss on this event. We’ll be aiming to bounce back from that over the course of Friday and Saturday.
Friday Line Up
Andy Jenkins will return to the fold refreshed and ready to rumble on Friday after his day off on Thursday and he’ll look to get himself right back in the overall mix over the course of the day. To do that he’ll have to overcome the significant challenges of Arron Monk and Paul Nicholson, and the slightly lesser challenges of Adam Huckvale and James Hubbard. It is the turn of Diogo Portela to have the day off and recharge his batteries.
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Outright Betting
The group winner over the last couple of days has largely boiled down to the outcome of one match but that isn’t going to be the case on Friday, with three players all of sufficient enough quality to still be in the mix. That makes betting on the group a little harder in terms of a 33% chance of finding the winner, but if you do bet on it and are successful then you will get better value than in either of the last two days.
Paul Nicholson would probably be my pick if I had a gun to my head but the one thing we’ve seen in this particular league over the three weeks is that players tend to lack a bit of consistency and that is a concern. Arron Monk was clearly getting frustrated with his form on Thursday so I’ll leave him out while Andy Jenkins could be anything after a day off. Adam Huckvale misses too many doubles and James Hubbard is trying too hard. It is an easy group to swerve really.
Match Betting
I’ll go with one over the course of Friday and it comes in one of the big matches of the afternoon as Arron Monk takes on Paul Nicholson. If you went with the week so far, given that Nicholson has won their two matches 5-4, you would either back ‘The Asset’ or take over 7.5 legs but I’m actually going the other way and taking Monk to win this match, although I get why bookmakers have this priced up largely as a pick ‘em.
Although Nicholson has won 5-4 on both occasions this week, Monk has actually averaged 6.47 and 8.13 points more than his opponent in those games, the key difference being that Nicholson won the throw in both matches and used it to good effect in the deciding leg. There is no guarantee he will have that on Friday and even then Monk missed a double to win their match on Tuesday. Monk is the better scorer of these two and I wouldn’t be surprised if the week starts catching up with Nicholson at some point. I’d have Monk the favourite here and will take him at 10/11.
Tips
Back A.Monk to beat P.Nicholson for a 3/10 stake at 1.91 with BetVictor
Back him here:
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