The opening round concludes at the World Seniors Darts Championship on Friday when seven world champions and the man currently in possession of this trophy take to the Circus Tavern stage for the first time this week.
We saw some very competitive action on the opening day of the tournament and as the bigger names start to arrive at the party the quality should elevate too. As with Thursday, we have two sessions of play to enjoy on Friday.
Afternoon Session
We begin the second day with the oldest player in the competition looking to make it through to the next stage when the 1988 world champion Bob Anderson goes up against the debutant Andy Jenkins, one of our outright picks for the weekend. There are only two current world champions in the field this week and one of them is second onto the stage when the holder of the WDF title, Neil Duff, gets his maiden Seniors campaign underway against fellow world champion Lisa Ashton.
The third match of the afternoon session sees two of the more entertaining darts players of their generation going at it when the popular Tony O’Shea, perennial major finalist on the BDO circuit, goes up against Leonard Gates, who showed all of his personality at Alexandra Palace in the PDC World Championship in December. The afternoon closer sees the 1983 world champion Keith Deller on show when he takes on one of the qualifiers in Michael Huntley.
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Evening Session
We have a really good evening session to enjoy, one which 10 years ago would have been a box office session of darts. It begins with the man who famously beat Phil Taylor to win the world title on this stage in John Part. He goes up against ‘The Matchstick’ Co Stompe, who makes his debut in this tournament here. Two more debutants meet in the second match of the evening when the three-time world champion Glen Durrant takes on the former World Masters winner Mark Dudbridge.
All eyes will be on one man in the third match of the evening. Phil Taylor transformed darts in a way that few sportsmen have done to their sport before and he will go in search of a maiden Seniors world title with his run beginning against the qualifier Colin McGarry in what is a standout match on the card. The final match of the opening round sees Robert Thornton beginning his title defence when he takes on Roland Scholten who is no stranger to this stage.
Betting
I’ll go with two bets to add to the winner I had on Thursday. The first of those comes in the form of Michael Huntley to do a bit of a job on Keith Deller. Deller has played in all the seniors events last season and only beat Bob Anderson at the Seniors Masters. He lost to Larry Butler in this a year ago and was downed by Colin McGarry in the Matchplay. He didn’t average as much as 81 in any of those matches. Mike Huntley came through a qualifying event to take his place in this draw and in that tournament he was regularly averaging over 90 and did the same in his week in the Modus Super Series last month where he made the final. This is his TV debut which is a concern but if he settles in the surroundings I expect Huntley to have too much for a Deller who’ll give his all but might well be outgunned here.
Phil Taylor was the early jolly when the odds came out for this tournament but I believe there is every chance he doesn’t even make it out of the first round when he comes up against Colin McGarry who is sure to put a real challenge down when they meet on Friday evening. This is not the Taylor that won 16 world titles and he is getting no younger and while his competitive edge will never die and he has had laser eye surgery ahead of this tournament to bring about an improvement, he is going to be vulnerable to younger players. McGarry showed at the Seniors Matchplay that he can play darts. He made the quarter finals there beating Keith Deller 8-3 with an 89.73 average, Peter Evison 8-0 with a 95.43 average and then lost to Kevin Painter 8-5 with a 90.33 average. Taylor made the final of that tournament and all four of his averages were lower than anything McGarry threw that week. While I would have liked McGarry to have had a spin at the Modus events to get some competitive juices flowing, there is still enough evidence that he can lay it down to Taylor, who in every Seniors event he has played has struggled massively in the first round. If he struggles here he might not see round two. I’ll take the Northern Irishman to pull off what many might perceive to be a bigger shock than it would be.
Tips
Back M.Huntley (-1.5 sets) to beat K.Deller for a 3/10 stake at 1.85 with Coral
Back C.McGarry to beat P.Taylor for a 3/10 stake at 2.63 with Betway
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