The opening day of the Belgian Darts Open takes place on Friday where we have two sessions of action as the 32 qualifiers battle it out with the aim of progressing through to Saturday where a seeded player will await them.
Although we have to wait until Saturday for the likes of Michael Smith and Michael van Gerwen to join the party, such is the strength in depth in darts these days there is still plenty to enjoy over the course of Friday.
Afternoon Session
We get underway with a man known best for his BDO and WDF exploits as Richard Veenstra takes on Bradley Brooks for a spot in the second round before Dennis Nilsson looks to make progress at the expense of another young star in Ted Evetts. Jeff Smith has qualified for this European Tour offering and his reward for doing so is a first round match against Damian Mol. We then head to the halfway point of the afternoon with Keane Barry looking to build on some good recent form when he takes on Sven Hilling.
The second part of the afternoon begins with the German player Gabriel Clemens looking to make it through to the second round when he takes on Graham Usher before Jose de Sousa will look to kick start his year at the expense of Francois Schweyen. Robert Owen has shown bits and pieces of good form over the last few years and will want to get the better of Stefan Bellmont while the final match of the afternoon sees Jermaine Wattimena going up against Andy Baetens.
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Evening Session
We have a really good evening session to look forward to on Friday and it begins with the former World Championship quarter finalist Callan Rydz going up against Matt Campbell before Daryl Gurney takes to the stage to go up against Dylan Slevin. Ross Smith will hope to defend the European title later in the year but in order to get there he needs results and will hope to get one against Martijn Kleermaker. One of the big ties of the first round take us to the break as Gary Anderson goes up against Krzysztof Ratajski.
We come out of the interval with the other standout clash on the opening day which sees James Wade going up against Raymond van Barneveld in a heavyweight battle. One of the two home stars on show in the evening then takes to the stage when Kim Huybrechts meets Ricky Evans before Chris Dobey faces Dalibor Smolik. The action concludes on Friday with the Belgian number one Dimitri Van den Bergh going up against Ian White.
Betting
I’ll go with a couple of bets over the course of the opening day. The first one is on the home player Andy Baetens as he goes up against Jermaine Wattimena. Wattimena, as I have mentioned a lot over the last few years, is a player whose ceiling is solid without being spectacular and I always think he is vulnerable to a player who can score well and Baetens is very much someone who fits that mould. This is a big weekend for Baetens. Not only is he playing in front of a home crowd but he doesn’t have a tour card so if he can go big this weekend it would help with a quest of becoming a professional player down the line. He has a nice draw and I expect him to be right up for this and will back the Belgian to get the win here.
The other player I like to win on Friday is Raymond van Barneveld. He is putting together an acceptable European Tour campaign without it being exceptional but some of the draws he has had have been nasty, such as Dimitri Van den Bergh in this round a week ago. You probably couldn’t say that James Wade is much better in terms of who the Dutchman could have faced but at least with Wade, Barneveld will know there is a good chance he will outscore ‘The Machine’. That then brings this one about the doubles and Barney hasn’t been bad on that recently. If he scores like we are used to seeing I think the odds are the wrong way around in this one.
Tips
Back A.Baetens to beat J.Wattimena for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with William Hill
Back R.van Barneveld to beat J.Wade for a 3/10 stake at 2.10 with William Hill
Back them here:
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