Tag: premier league darts

Darts is back and coming at us thick and fast right now as we head into our fourth consecutive night of Premier League Darts, all of which is taking place in Milton Keynes at the Marshall Arena.

Despite the recent World Snooker Championships trialling fans in attendance for the final, the PDC have confirmed that the remainder of the Premier League regular season will conclude behind closed doors.

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We have enjoyed four nights of excellent top class arrows already this week as we blitz through the rest of the Premier League schedule. Last night, Judgement Night saw Rob Cross throw his last darts of the 2020 campaign as he was eliminated following his dismal defeat at the hands of Glen Durrant.

From here, anyone remaining will now be fancying their chances of reaching the playoffs. There’s no time to rest however as there are still another six nights play to be held over the next eight days as the action refuses to let up.

Tonight, things continue starting with the current table topper.

Glen Durrant V Gerwyn Price

What an opener this promises to be as the game’s two most in-form darters going head to head.

Duzza is holding on to a two point cushion at the top and will be buzzing from a hugely impressive three days so far in Milton Keynes.

On Tuesday, Duzza saw off Peter Wright before dismissing Michael van Gerwen in a 7-3 mauling which preceded Thursday’s 7-4 win over Rob Cross that saw the 2018 World Champion eliminated.

His opponent Gerwyn Price has dropped just the one solitary leg over the last two nights beating Gary Anderson and Jermaine Wattimena 7-1 and 7-0 respectively. The Welshman is looking far more like himself at the minute and together these two players in particular look as though they are enjoying the one match per day format.

This is maybe too tough to call and I just cant split this pair so I’ll go with a draw.

Peter Wright v Gary Anderson

Two world champions play next as Scottish pair Peter ‘Snakebite’ Wright and Gary ‘The Flying Scotsman’ Anderson go head-to-head in game two.

Only two points separate these two World Cup winning teammates with Wright, second in the table, slightly ahead of Anderson.

Last month’s World Matchplay runner-up Gary Anderson is tied on points in fourth with Michael van Gerwen whom he has beaten 7-4 since the restart as well as Michael Smith but was sent packing by Gerwyn Price a day later.

Wright has posted back to back wins over Jeffrey de Zwaan and Daryl Gurney but he really should have recorded a 100% record this week and would have done were it not for some dodgy maths during his 6-6 draw with Glen Durrant on Tuesday.

This is sure to be another tight one and could go either way but, buoyed on from beating MVG last night, I think Anderson could well take the points here.

Nathan Aspinall v Michael van Gerwen

Michael van Gerwen has, rather unusually, lost back-to-back to games in as many nights. So unusual, in fact, that it’s the first time that’s happened in the Premier League since 2018.

The world number one is facing Nathan Aspinall, who battled back brilliantly to beat Michael Smith 7-5 last night when looking at defeat in the face.

That said, MVG’s poor run will end at some point and I think that point could well be tonight.

Michael Smith v Daryl Gurney

Daryl Gurney narrowly survived Judgement Night and will today play Michael Smith for his efforts. Bully Boy has hit 18 maximums hit in his last three games but somehow managed to lose on Thursday when he had victory almost in the bag against Nathan Aspinall.

With Rob Cross now gone, these two are the bottom pair and need to turn things around soon in the hope of making it to London for October’s revised playoff schedule.

Gurney has averaged a total 92.24 over his three games this week and could struggle against Smith, who is favourite for a reason. I think Smith will win with ease here unless Superchin can find some form from somewhere.

• (7/5) Glen Durrant (15/4) Gerwyn Price (13/10)
• (20/21) Peter Wright (15/4) Gary Anderson (2/1)
• (11/5) Nathan Aspinall (15/4)  Michael van Gerwen (5/6)
• (5/6) Michael Smith (15/4) Daryl Gurney (1/5)

Prices from bet365

Remaining fixtures and dates

Night 11, Saturday August 29

• Daryl Gurney v Peter Wright
• Michael Smith v Nathan Aspinall
• Gary Anderson v Glen Durrant
• Michael van Gerwen v Gerwyn Price

Night 12, Sunday August 30

• Nathan Aspinall v Gary Anderson
• Peter Wright v Gerwyn Price
• Michael van Gerwen v Michael Smith
• Glen Durrant v Daryl Gurney

Night 13, Wednesday September 2

• Glen Durrant v Michael Smith
• Daryl Gurney v Gary Anderson
• Peter Wright v Michael van Gerwen
• Gerwyn Price v Nathan Aspinall

Night 14, Thursday September 3

• Gerwyn Price v Daryl Gurney
• Gary Anderson v Michael Smith
• Peter Wright v Nathan Aspinall
• Glen Durrant v Michael van Gerwen

Night 15, Friday September 4

• Daryl Gurney v Nathan Aspinall
• Glen Durrant v Peter Wright
• Gary Anderson v Michael van Gerwen
• Michael Smith v Gerwyn Price

Night 16, Saturday September 5

• Peter Wright v Michael Smith
• Michael van Gerwen v Daryl Gurney
• Nathan Aspinall v Glen Durrant
• Gerwyn Price v Gary Anderson

Play-Offs – Thursday October 22

The O2, London

Semi-Finals (Best of 19 legs)

• First v Fourth
• Second v Third

Finals (Best of 21 legs)

• Winner SF 1 v Winner SF 2

QUICK GLANCE AT DARTS PREMIER LEAGUE NIGHT 10

Venue: Marshall Arena, Milton Keynes

Dates: 28.08.2020

Format: Max of 12

Current Champion: Michael van Gerwen

Where To Watch: Sky Sports

When To Watch: (1900 GMT)

This week’s upcoming Darts Premier League night at the Utilita Arena in Newcastle will not be taking place. Instead, Newcastle’s evening has been rescheduled for Thursday, October 1. The decision to postpone Thursday’s event was taken by the PDC after the UK Government restricted all non-essential social contact and removed emergency service support for mass gatherings.

The rescheduling of the Newcastle night means that the North-Eastern city will now host the end of season playoffs, originally scheduled for London’s O2 Arena. It also means that Newcastle becomes the third Darts Premier League night of the 2020 season to be postponed after last week’s announcement that double Dutch headed in Rotterdam has been rescheduled for September 9-10.

With the season on lockdown, we can take a quick look at the table as it stands for what we hope will only be two weeks. This, though, seems unlikely. While last week’s Cheltenham Festival went ahead as planned, the Grand National at Aintree has been canceled as has all horse racing in the UK. The Premier League (football), for which Liverpool are 25 points clear, has penciled in a date of April 3 for a return but this too seems ambitious, particularly given UEFA’s decision to postpone Euro 2020 for a whole year to allow for football’s domestic seasons to resume and complete.

With what would have been Night Ten, now being Night Seven at the SSE Arena in Belfast scheduled for Thursday, April 2, the next games we can – fingers crossed – expect to see are Michael Smith v Gary Anderson, Michael van Gerwen v Rob Cross, Nathan Aspinall v Gerwyn Price, Chris Dobey v Daryl Gurney and Peter Wright v Glen Durrant.

As we stand, the table of the suspended Darts Premier League looks like this.

Premier League Of Darts Night Six Recap

One of the great modern-day darts rivalries lived up to its billing last Thursday in Liverpool as Michael van Gerwen and Gerwyn Price stepped out to provide some quality darts. Just as he has when they met four days earlier in the UK Open final on Sunday, the Dutchman just about emerged the winner of a tight contest. 

This time, the world number one won three legs on the trot to claim a 7-5 victory, after the first 10 legs of the match, all went with throw. The break finally came in the 11th leg with an MVG 12 darter. Mighty Mike needed to be at his best against The Iceman and posted an average of 106.27, his highest of the Premier League season so far. 

In true Iceman style, Price added a bit of controversy into the mix when he released a dart early while MVG was still picking his out of the board causing the Dutchman to duck or nearly catch one in the head, which led to a frosty fist bump – no handshakes – at the end of the contest.

The night opened with an impressive display put on by Peter Wright as he outclassed Michael Smith who had been going well in the Darts Premier League before then. The world champion averaged 100.78 compared to his opponent’s 94 and ran out a relatively comfortable 7-4 winner. 

Snakebite’s high quality finishing allowed him to power into a 5-1 lead. Bully Boy finally came to life in the seventh when he threatened an unlikely comeback after he won three of the next four legs. While it shortened the margin of defeat, it was merely delaying the inevitable as Snakebite closed out the match with an impressive ten darter.

Daryl Gurney’s nightmare Darts Premier League season continued on Thursday as he failed to win again, this time suffering a 7-5 victory defeat to Glen Durrant who must be loving his dream debut season. Although, the three-time BDO world champion was unable to land a single maximum in the match, his finishing was hot enough to see him home, pinning seven from eleven shots at the double. 

Superchin opened the match with a decent 144 checkout but then fell 6-3 behind. He soon recovered tough and fought back to force a deciding leg. Duzza finished things off with a 14 darter which guarantees he goes into the unwanted break in the season top of the pile, while Gurney remains winless at the bottom. 

This week’s local contender Stephen Bunting became the sixth challenger to manage a Darts Premier League draw as he took the deciding leg in his game against Rob Cross, denying Voltage a much-needed victory. The Merseysider had, at one point, engineered himself into a 4-1 lead only to see Cross fight back by taking four legs on the spin to move ahead. From there, the following two legs went with throw before Cross missed his effort at double 18 that would have given him the points but instead let The Bullet back in where he held his nerve to nick a 6-6 tie.

In the final Darts Premier League game of the night, week, month and possibly even longer, Nathan Aspinall showed plenty of guts and spirit to fightback from 5-1 down to rescue a point and draw with Gary Anderson. While Aspinall had the steel to fight back, he really should have taken the first leg which would have made for a very different story. 

Instead, her missed seven darts at a double to break the Flying Scotsman, who himself wasn’t at his best either but looked good for the win when his 87 checkout put him two legs in sight of victory. It was then that The Asp sprang into life, reeling off four legs on the spin while landing four 180s at the same time. Aspinall nearly took the next leg too but Anderson grabbed it with Aspinall waiting on tops. The Asp got his finish in the next as the pair split the points.

Gary Anderson made sure of his place in the DPL playoffs by beating the current champion, Michael van Gerwen in a shock 7-5 victory last Thursday night in his hometown of Aberdeen. The DPL Playoffs will take place this week in London, after which we will know the winner of the 2018 Darts Premier League.

With his victory, Anderson came in third place in the table meaning he will avoid the Dutchman until at least the final. MVG, who topped the table, will instead play Rob Cross, who finished fourth having won his match. Anderson will play Michael ‘Bully Boy’ Smith in the night’s other semi-final.

Back to last week’s action with The Flying Scotsman already assured his place at the O2 before stepping up to the oche after Daryl Gurney had failed to beat Peter Wright by the 7-2 margin that he required in order to jump Anderson. Had Gurney achieved the feat, Anderson would have needed to avoid a 7-0 whitewash but instead got to enjoy a pressure-free game, shooting down the world number one with a superb performance in front of his home crowd. Aberdeen’s Anderson averaged 98 to MVG’s 100.4 as both players eased home. Landing a 112 to send himself 6-4 ahead, Anderson stood steady to put an end to an unwanted sequence of four successive defeats to the Dutchman.

An unwell Michael Smith claimed second spot following a 6-6 draw with Raymond van Barneveld. Barney hit three ton + checkouts in the opening six legs while Smith claimed one of his own with a 124 that sent him 3-2 ahead. Both chuckers also threw three 180s as they shared the legs and the points while treating the crowd to a brilliant match despite having nothing on the line to play for.

As mentioned, Daryl Gurney failed to get the victory he needed to stand any chance of reaching the play-offs after he also drew 6-6 in his match with Peter Wright. Despite leading 3-1 and 5-2 at various points of the match, Superchin couldn’t find his best form and take advantage of another Snakebite horror show on the doubles. Wright did eventually improve, winning four of the last five legs which allowed last year’s finalist to climb of the bottom of this year’s table, but his goose was already cooked long before this match. For Gurney, he can at least take consolation from the fact he only lost four matches throughout his maiden Premier League campaign and finished a very respectable fifth.

In a night of ties, Rob Cross and Simon Whitlock also drew 6-6 in a poor-quality match in which the world champion averaged just 89.31 over The Wizard, who averaged 88.38. Voltage also missed a massive 13 darts at the doubles but at least landed five 180s to show some kind of encouragement going into the London playoffs on May 17.

Final Premier League Darts Table

• MVG Pts 23
• Smith Pts 20
• Anderson Pts 19
• Cross Pts 19
• Gurney Pts 16
• Barney Pts 16
• Wright Pts 14
• Whitlock Pts 13
• Suljovic Pts 4
• Price Pts 2

Darts Premier League Play-Off Betting Tips

We are down to the final four with the semi-finals held at The O2 Arena in London. The action will getunderway from 19:00 (GMT) and will be broadcast live on Sky Sports. The first match of the night is the semi-final between Michael van Gerwen and Rob Cross. MVG scored a league-high tally of 11x 120+ checkouts during this year’s run to the O2. He has also been utterly dominant against Cross, having won 10 of their 12 meetings, so I will more than fancy his chances in this first-to-10 legs semi-final. For the record, van Gerwen to win, hit a 120+ checkout and average over 100 and Cross to hit the most 180s is worth 11/2 with Betway.

The other semi-final is between Michael Smith and a reinvigorated Gary Anderson. It’s his return to form that makes me think that Anderson’s dominance over Smith will continue here. Anderson has, after all, won nine of their 12 meetings to date. The early season was filled with doubt while Anderson was hampered by a back injury when he last lost to Smith, blowing a 5-1 lead on the opening night. Since then, Anderson’s turn around has been nothing short of brilliant. Smith was unfancied at the start of the tourney and has done far better than expected to crash the top four.

That said, all but two of Smith’s 20 points this season were picked up against players outside of the top four and he has averaged north of 100 just once all season. But Anderson has played ruthless throughout and improved each week, hitting 18x 100+ checkouts and the second-most 180s (behind Daryl Gurney). Form like that should take him into yet another career final. For this reason, it’s worth taking advantage of this combo bet from Betway; Anderson to win, hit the most 180s and two 100+ checkouts and Smith to average under 100 for 6/1.

If the semi-finals go as expected that would make for an MVG vs Anderson final which, if last week’s result counts for anything, could potentially throw up a shock result. Mighty Mike lost to Anderson in the final match of the regular season last week, but beware — his victory at the Dutch Darts Masters over the weekend was his 11th title of the year and the 23rd successful final in succession, demonstrating that the Dutch maestro rarely disappoints when the stakes are high. These two are way ahead of the others when it comes to three-digit finishes, having thrown a minimum of two in a single game eight times between them.

Should they meet in a best-of-21 final as expected, another four in the match should prove no problem at all making it a sound wager at Betway that’s worth 14/1. Add value to your final bet with this beauty: van Gerwen and Anderson to reach the final, Van Gerwen to win, Anderson to hit the most 180s and over 3.5 100+ checkouts in the game now worth 14/1.

The final prices for an outright win with the online bookmakers Betway are as follows. Bully Boy was an 80/1 outsider for Premier League glory at the start of the season but is now showing at 2/1, while only Rob Cross is longer priced at 7/2. The super short favourite is obviously Michael van Gerwen at 1/5 just in from Gary Anderson’s 2/5.

(1/5) Michael van Gerwen v Rob Cross (7/2)
(2/1) Michael Smith v Gary Anderson (2/5)