The European Tour is back on the darting calendar this weekend with he Dutch Darts Championship following hot on the heels of us finding out who was crowned the Premier League champion. This is the seventh qualifying event for the European Championship later in the season.
Dave Chisnall landed this title last year on his domination of the European Tour campaign. He will look to keep hold of the crown against a field which has had a couple of big name withdrawals but still looks pretty strong.
Recent Winners
2023 – Dave Chisnall
2022 – Michael Smith
2018 – Ian White
The Format
The format for these tournaments remains the same as before, which means that the unseeded players meet each other over the course of the play on Friday before the last 32 of the tournament is played over two sessions of action on Saturday, with the last 16 on Sunday afternoon and the quarter finals on Sunday night. They are all the best-of-11 legs with the semi-finals also on Sunday evening. They are the best-of-13 and then the final in the same session is the best-of-15 legs. The draw has been pre-determined and is played in a straight knockout format.
Top Half
We are back to the number one seed being in the top half of the draw this weekend. That is Dave Chisnall so he heads up the top half. If everything goes to the seedings and the numbers he is slated to meet the home star Danny Noppert in the semi-final. A raft of good seeded players will be out to stop that from happening though with Michael van Gerwen the biggest of those on home soil. The Masters champion Stephen Bunting is another while Chris Dobey, Jonny Clayton, Ricardo Pietreczko and Ryan Searle are all more than dangerous on their day.
With the way the qualifying criteria for the European Tour works these days we are getting used to some real big names among the unseeded fraternity in these things. James Wade and Joe Cullen head up those in the top half this weekend while Mike de Decker and Ryan Joyce have both had decent runs in events recently. Niels Zonneveld, Kevin Doets and Jermaine Wattimena will hope to use the home crowd to their advantage while Andrew Gilding could be a dangerous sleeper.
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Bottom Half
That means that the second seed will be the top draw in the bottom half of the bracket this weekend. That is the Australian star Damon Heta. If everything goes with the seedings then he is on a collision course with Gerwyn Price in the semi-final. As with the top half, there are six very solid seeds looking to stop that encounter from happening. They are Daryl Gurney, former European champion Ross Smith, Martin Schindler, who has already won a European Tour event this season, the home young ace Gian van Veen, Josh Rock and Peter Wright.
There is no need to look too far for the pick of the unseeded players in this half of the draw given where the tournament is being held. That will be Raymond van Barneveld but Dirk van Duijvenbode is another home ace who won’t be short of crowd support. The UK Open champion Dimitri Van den Bergh is another unseeded star in this half of the draw while Gabriel Clemens, Jose de Sousa and Brendan Dolan are seasoned campaigners. Callan Rydz, Luke Woodhouse, Ritchie Edhouse and Cameron Menzies have the potential to be dangerous too.
Betting
This looks a wide open draw with some big names missing and that might play into the hands of Ross Smith. The 2022 European champion might have it tough in his first round as he’ll play the winner of the match between Dimitri Van den Bergh and Gabriel Clemens but should he come through that then his draw could easily open right up with the other three seeds in his quarter being Damon Heta, Daryl Gurney and Martin Schindler.
In many ways Smith has been the unlucky man of the European Tour in recent events. In the last few tournaments he has gone down to Luke Humphries, Luke Littler having beaten Michael van Gerwen in the quarter final, Gary Anderson in a final after he had beaten van Gerwen in the semi-final and Gerwyn Price in a deciding leg. The first three of those players aren’t here this week and the latter isn’t exactly firing on all cylinders right now. With a draw that isn’t going to get as tough as that should he overcome whoever he meets first, there is enough in the Smith form to suggest that he is a danger at 25/1.
Tips
Back R.Smith to win Dutch Darts Championship (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 26.00 with Coral (1/2 1-2)
