The first weekend of the PDC World Darts Championship begins with a double session day of action on Saturday, one which gets underway in the afternoon as eight players set foot onto the Alexandra Palace stage looking to take a step closer to realising their dreams.
We are still deep in the first round of the tournament and another three matches from that part of the draw open up the afternoon session before two men will battle it out for a place in the third round after the Christmas break.
Jamie Hughes vs Raymond Smith
The first match onto the stage sees Jamie Hughes taking on one half of the Australian father and son combination who have qualified for this tournament in the form of Raymond Smith, with Devon Petersen awaiting the winner in the second round.
Hughes is an experienced campaigner who when he is good he is very good but he can also be terrible. Injuries haven’t helped him since he made the switch to the PDC and as a result of that we never truly know what Hughes is going to turn up. Smith is competing on this stage for the first time since 2018 when he went down in a deciding set to Alan Tabern but prior to that, earlier that year he destroyed Michael Smith 6-1 in the Brisbane Masters World Series event and he has been a regular at the BDO World Championship and World Masters so he has plenty of experience. You would expect Hughes to win this but he could get turned over is he doesn’t have his best stuff with him. I’m happy to leave this one alone either way.
Callan Rydz vs Yuki Yamada
The second match of the afternoon sees one of the stars of the pro tour this season in Callan Rydz taking on the Japanese qualifier Yuki Yamada who has been to this tournament before and will be looking to make the second round once again.
Yamada took care of Ryan Meikle on his debut at this event two years ago but then lost out to Darren Webster in the second round but you would think he will have his work cut out to get anything out of Rydz here. Rydz won’t have been favourite to win many matches on the stage but he is gaining in experience all the time and more importantly confidence now he has won a Players Championship event. I would imagine Rydz will win this fairly comfortably but that is reflected in the odds so I can’t find anything that offers value.
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Darius Labanauskas vs Mike de Decker
The last of the first round matches in the afternoon session sees the Lithuanian number one Darius Labanauskas looking to begin another decent run in the World Championship when he takes on a Mike de Decker who is appearing here for the second time.
De Decker won’t have good memories of his debut on this stage last year where he lost 3-0 to the Japanese qualifier Edward Foulkes and averaged less than 90 in doing so and he certainly won’t have good vibes from his last TV outings which were at the Grand Slam where he won one leg in three matches and averaged in the 70s in his last two games. It goes without saying that unless there is a dramatic improvement he isn’t going to win this because Labanauskas is a better than steady performer on the bigger stages and has been to the quarter finals here so he knows how to get the job done on this stage. De Decker deserves credit for going as deep as he did in the qualifier but the fact he was only a reserve for the tournament probably tells us where his game is at present and ‘Big D’ should win this with a bit in hand.
Ian White vs Chris Landman
The most interesting match of the afternoon is the only second round clash on the card as Ian White looks to make it back into the third round when he meets the Dutch debutant Chris Landman who had an emphatic 3-0 win over Scott Mitchell in the first round.
The score suggests Landman did a job on Mitchell but really the former Lakeside champion beat himself by missing a stupid amount of doubles in what would have been a pretty routine win for ‘Scotty Dog’ had he hit even an acceptable percentage of those doubles. That means White should win this match and win it with more than a bit in hand but he has had an operation this year and is working his way back up to his best form. Usually when a player has missed a period of time doubles become an issue and White was never completely watertight on them anyway so that could keep Landman in this match. With a gun to my head I’d trust White to get the job done but there’s no need to take that risk.
Tips
Back D.Labanauskas (-1.5 sets) to beat M.de Decker for a 3/10 stake at 1.91 with Coral
Back him here:
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