Ahead of the PDC World Darts Championship beginning on Friday evening we are continuing to go through the quarters of the draw and attempting to pick out the value in the various markets and having done the first section it is time to look at the second one.
This is the quarter where Peter Wright will be under pressure to go very well as he defends the 500,000 points he won when he picked up this title two years ago but there are a number of potential dangers in his way.
Draw
(4) Peter Wright v Jim Williams/Norman Madhoo
(29) Raymond van Barneveld v Radek Szaganski/Marko Kantele
(13) James Wade v Matt Campbell/Lourence Ilagan
(20) Andrew Gilding v Christian Kist/Luke Littler
(5) Gerwyn Price v Connor Scutt/Krzysztof Kciuk
(28) Brendan Dolan v Mickey Mansell/Xiaochen Zong
(12) Dirk van Duijvenbode v Keegan Brown/Boris Krcmar
(21) Gary Anderson v Simon Whitlock/Paolo Nebrida
Preview
Once again I have split the quarter up into a red and green half with the winners of each meeting in the quarter final. The red half should be all about Peter Wright in theory but he hasn’t exactly had a stellar 2023 despite winning the European Championship and were he to face Jim Williams in round two that would have banana skin etched all over it. Raymond van Barneveld knows how to win this thing while James Wade has been in good form for the last couple of months. Andrew Gilding might have seen his form drop off but he is the reigning UK Open champion. Two standout names come along in the qualifiers in the red half alongside Jim Williams. Radek Szaganski has already won a Players Championship event while many judges think Luke Littler is destined for huge things. Christian Kist can live with most on his day too.
The green section on paper is one of the toughest in the whole draw with former champions Gerwyn Price and Gary Anderson lined up for what would be a blockbuster round four clash to take us into 2024. It is hard to see that match not taking place too because Brendan Dolan doesn’t really inspire over the longer distances and Dirk van Duijvenbode is injured. Of the qualifiers, Keegan Brown, Simon Whitlock and Connor Scutt should make it into round two and Brown would have a good chance of reaching round three but I would be surprised if he goes much further.
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Betting
This is a very open quarter. I think the winner of Gerwyn Price against Gary Anderson will be the green representative in the quarter final. My gut feeling is that will be the latter but I wouldn’t really want to pick the winner of that with any certainty so I’ll head to the red part of the draw for a bet on the quarter. I’m keen to oppose Peter Wright because he isn’t in great form and he is defending a lot of ranking points this week and he doesn’t have an easy run with potentially Jim Williams and then Raymond van Barneveld just to make the last 16.
The seeding would suggest that James Wade will meet Andrew Gilding in the bottom half of the red section but I would be very surprised if it isn’t Luke Littler he is facing in the third round. That wouldn’t be the easiest game in the world for Wade but he has schooled plenty of young bucks in his career and will be there to pounce when Littler does miss doubles. I’m happy to take the chance that he does win that match and then move into the quarter final from where Price and Anderson will have bashed each other up in a right old ding dong. You can get 9/1 on Wade to win this quarter and when you consider he has made the semi-final or further in the European Championship and Grand Slam of Darts recently and he lost in the quarter final of the Players Championship Finals when he ran into the form man Luke Humphries. Wade has won his quarter in this event four times in the past and that price looks big to do it again.
Tips
Back J.Wade to win Quarter 2 for a 1/10 stake at 10.00 with Coral
