Worlds day 5-6 reaction post

Thought I was only one day behind on one of these. But it's two. Whoopsie. Still, that keeps in cadence with how often I have actually been posting, so that's fine. Vamos.

Dolan/Dudeney - Let's give credit to Tavis here. He has had a really hard year, but got here, and did not play that badly at all. Dolan did enough, but against a lot of other qualifiers might have been in some bother here, but this seems like more for something that Dudeney can build on in year two of the card rather than a big confidence builder for Brendan.

Menzies/Manby - Well that was a thing. I think most things that have been said about this game have already been said, I don't want to add anything to it beyond that I think Cammy needs some help, and he should get the help he needs, which I think he will. In terms of Charlie, which has clearly been hugely overlooked here, I don't think that's his best game by some stretch, it was alright, but I'll put that down to first game things.

Suljovic/Cameron - Not really sure why the averages were so high in this one. Seems to be the other player keeping things in good order and not too many missed doubles, rather than really good power scoring. We thought Mensur would move on, and he did.

Wright/van Leuven - Meh. Poor game between poor players. Peter needed to do basically nothing, but we thought doing that would be enough for the win, and it was. Probably won't get away with that against Merk.

Lukeman/Hopp - Another not particularly good game, but it went with form. Martin's not in it, I'm not sure if Max is in it, but he's closer to being in it than Lukeman is, and that was enough.

van Duijvenbode/Baetens - This seemed like a fun one. Andy finally bringing the game that we know he has, and Dirk doing just enough to respond to it. Nice match gents.

Clayton/Lipscombe - Feels like one where the seed did just enough to get through and not expend more on the game than they needed to do. Adam's performance looks fine on paper, just an awkward draw.

Scutt/Whitlock - Got to give some credit to Whitlock for battling back into this one, at two sets down this could easily have been a case of ok nice to be back but done now, but two last leg wins, he kept going. I suppose if you've been on the other end of one of the sport's big comebacks you'll have the intent to keep going.

Soutar/Harju - Wowza. Did not see this coming as it did, particularly after Alan started like a train winning the first six legs. Unfortunately, he continued like a train, not being able to go more than fifteen minutes without breaking down or otherwise being cancelled, letting Teemu right back into it to the point where he was getting match darts, for full disclosure I was on Harju, but I have no complaints. No business getting darts to win in the first place, can say I was on the right side of the line, we move on.

Kenny/Hood - Really good debut for Justin. Nick wasn't playing badly, was merely Hood just playing lights out and bringing it when it would have been really easy for him to take a set or so to get used to the stage. We'll come on to Noppert in a bit but that's the sort of showing that'll ask some questions.

Williams/Nebrida - Kind of the same really. Paolo was perfectly fine, didn't do much of anything wrong, was merely a case of Williams putting in towards the top end of the performances we've seen of him, and getting the results which we might not have done so quite so often.

Dobey/Zong - I mean realistically Chris was never in any sort of massive trouble, but Zong did look to miss quite a few doubles, it's good signs of progress so maybe next year we see a Kumar sort of thing where he's developed for another year, gets a more favourable draw and then moves on.

Pietreczko/de Sousa - Weird one. Ricardo looked to be doing just enough, but all three of the first three sets went to deciders. Not overly convincing from Pikachu, maybe on another day things fall a bit differently and we're still talking about Jose maybe being able to retain his card. But we won't.

Noppert/van der Velde - Thumbs up to both players here. Jurjen was bringing things in all aspects, but in one of the few matches I've actually watched this year, Danny, when under what was probably a bit of unexpected pressure, brought the big key visits when it needed. Very good signs for both.

Price/Gawlas - Huge disparity between the players. Adam only got a couple of legs because, in all honesty, Gerwyn let him. Solid enough showing from Gezzy, Gawlas still looks as inconsistent as ever. Back to back visits of 180 and then 3 demonstrate that perfectly.

Springer/Comito - Now this was the real big shocker. Joe looked a bit better than we expected, probably quite a lot better, but I have no idea what that was from Niko. He was not good. I mean if he was still suffering from whatever he pulled out of Minehead for then maybe, but I don't think that was the case. It just seems like a really off day coupled with Joe being very opportunistic when needed, so fair play to him for that.

Gambling continues to go well. Monday was excellent. Today (yesterday by the time this post goes live) was break even, if Harju had have nicked it we would have been in fantastic shape for the tournament, but we won't be greedy. We're getting close to a round two projections post so keep checking in for that one.

Worlds day 3-4 reaction post

Lot of stuff went down over the weekend so let's go through game by game.

Vandenbogaerde/Davies - Clearly didn't think Mario was an overwhelming favourite or anything like that, and Davies clearly had chances, but that was a pretty darned poor showing, only coming close in two sets? With your tour card on the line? Sure, as things have transpired he only needs a double to retain but that's probably the most important match he's had for two years and he was not close in it.

Gilding/Crabtree - Really expected a lot more from Cam here. Sure, not necessarily a get the win sort of performance, but conceding the first six legs basically kills the game.

Woodhouse/Krcmar - This looked like a fairly solid display from Luke in one that could have got twitchy with a very solid opponent taking the opening set, but very steady stuff from there saw him safely through.

Anderson/Hunt - This was weird. Hunt kept this one a lot closer than it really should have been, and if I remember the gameflow right, he was in position to actually win the match. Gary came through, but that was a lot less comfortable than it really should have been.

de Graaf/Lim - This one was really great to see, and it looked to be mainly Paul bringing it rather than Jeffrey throwing it away. Big story and real happy to see this one happen - not least because I bet on Lim.

Nijman/Sedlacek - Mentioned this was a tough draw for both pre. Maybe Karel could have got a bit closer on some of the sets, but Nijman did more than well enough to keep him at arms length with one of the better showings so far.

Humphries/Evetts - Another one that can go in the dull matches pile, Luke really not being touched at all, before Ted played OK for a set, only for Luke to finish it off in the fourth. Not much to say here.

Clemens/Spellman - This was very disappointing from Alex. He's a good player and this looked like a more than reasonable draw, but to win just the single leg is really quite a shame. Not as if Clemens was blowing him away, seven of nine won legs were in more than five visits so the game was open for Spellman.

Edhouse/Tata - Think most people had identified Edhouse as a seed that might be in danger early, and Tata as someone competent enough that he could cause problems, but I don't think anyone was really seeing a straight sets win for Jonny. Not a bad showing.

Taylor/Lukasiak - Straight forward win for Dom here, dropping just the one leg. Very good showing, Oskar's probably a bit overrated, but Taylor's really very good so to get through this easily ought not to be that much of a surprise.

Veenstra/Kumar - Now this is the shocking one. This is very much being opportunistic - Veenstra was averaging a fair chunk more and the two sets he won were very comprehensive. That said, Nitin came through when it mattered so fair play to him for getting this result after years of trying. Nice job.

Cullen/Brooks - Another one that was disappointing. Joe just doing his usual thing of deciding to show up at the worlds after doing not a great deal all year. Brooks missed a couple of chances but looked a bit below what he had been doing and should have had more than a couple of chances in all honesty. Thankfully I tempered my suggested betting size on this one.

Wenig/Plaisier - Lukas did well to pull this one back to some degree, could have run a bit out of control after Wesley won the first set to love, but couldn't get the key leg in the third set to really make things interesting.

van den Bergh/Beveridge - God knows what's up with Dimitri. I didn't have high expectations, but that was below even what I thought he might have been able to do. An absolute gift for Darren.

Bunting/Bialecki - Oh wait, we've got tiebreakers in the first round. Nice of someone to mention this rule change. Of course, this shouldn't have been anywhere near a tie breaker with Bunting two sets up and Bialecki not exactly tearing things up either, but Stephen will move on. Just about.

Hurrell/Buntz - Had a small flier on Stowe in this one. Think he was slightly unfortunate here, he had the chances to take this to a deciding set but Hurrell had just about enough.

Betting is going OK, as long as Brendan clears up this fourth set, got a few moderate sized bets in play today, Manby winning would put us in a really good spot so let's see what happens there.

Worlds day 1-2 reaction post

Very simply? Boring. Let's go through game by game and look at how things went:

Huybrechts/Merk - Arno was better than expected, but man Kim was bad. Thankfully this is why we have sample size warnings on projections

Smith/Ashton - Seed wins 3-0 boring

Littler/Labanauskas - Seed wins 3-0 boring

Razma/van den Herik - This was at least moderately close but Jamai just couldn't bring it when it mattered

Zonneveld/Puha - Hopes wasn't bad, but Niels just rolled for the most part

White/King - Some people have called this the Mansell/Long of this tournament. I would not disagree. That was just terrible

Searle/Landman - Seed wins 3-0 boring

Cross/Dekker - Seed wins 3-0 boring

Smith/Harrysson - ZOMG AN ACTUAL INTERESTING GAME INVOLVING A SEEDED PLAYER!!! I mean Andreas is one of the players that we would think has a reasonable chance of bucking the trend, and fair play to getting it done, but jesus christ Ross, all the chances were there to kill the game

Evans/Leung - Moderately tight sets, but better player gets it done, I guess not the worst game

van Veen/Reyes - Seed goes up 2-0, other guy tries a bit of a comeback but can't get it to the interesting part so boring

Heta/Lennon - See above

I feel the only thing we've actually learned is that Arno Merk might be a tad better than expected, so against the player he might play maybe he has round three potential, and also that Ian White is playing worse than expected by some distance, so that makes Cross even more of a favourite than he should be. Tiring few sessions. Will be at football tomorrow obv, may get back in the evening with these sorts of thoughts but might be Sunday.

New stupid tournament idea - Basho!

WARNING - NO WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP CONTENT IN THIS POST

I mentioned before I started on the worlds previews that I had a new stupid tournament format idea. So with the previews all done, let's look at it. For better or worse, I've been watching a lot of sumo over the past couple of months. Probably directly relates to them having a tournament in the UK for the first time since Phil Taylor had one world title, but whatever. What I liked about it was three fold, ignoring the actual merits of the sport:

a) Matches are quick. They can literally be over in seconds. Perfect for the Tiktok/ADHD addled generation.

b) The entirety of the pro scene has one continually moving, fluid divisional system, where competitors can rise or fall very quickly and will do so after a very good or bad tournament.

c) As such, every match matters - not just for those that want to win the outright title, there's a heck of a lot of pressure on getting the eighth win to have a winning record for the tournament, and conversely avoiding the eighth loss. But even after you've hit either mark, it still matters, as the amount you go up and down the rankings is not static, someone with a 7-8 record will only have a small drop, but end up 3-12 and you'll plummet.

So I then thought this could actually be a pretty good kind of system for darts in an odd way. How I would configure the tournament is like this:

- It runs across a seven day period starting on a Monday and ending on a Sunday, in something similar to a Euro Tour venue, replacing one European Tour and two Pro Tour events in the calendar. Total prize money would be relatively the same - the events being replaced would amount to £425k in prize money, but let's bump it to half a million (with revenue from additional sessions of live play open to the public, that does not seem absurd). Would probably look to hold around four of these per season, and each day's play has two sessions.

- The list of tour card holders is broken up into three roughly equal divisions - the top 40 who will play on the stage, then the next 40 and last 48 in lower divisions, who will play backstage on a pair of streamed boards. Whoever wants to enter plays, if there are fewer than 40 who enter in the bottom division, then Challenge Tour players complete the field just like in a Pro Tour. The bottom division stream on the afternoon session, the middle division on the evening session. If the stage schedule is running ahead of schedule then additional matches can be pulled from the stream room to fill out the time.

- Matches are a potentially very short format - first to gain a two leg lead wins the match, sudden death if 5-5. In other words, very similar to a tiebreaker deciding set at the worlds, except that if someone goes 2-0 up the match is over. To avoid the situation where it is the same player who is trying to hold to stay in the match all the time, rather than alternating legs, someone will have the darts in leg 1, then the other player will have it for the next TWO legs, and they swap throw every two legs after that.

- Opponents are determined for the following day after the previous day's matches are finished - there is no fixed match list. Who a player will get is typically based on trying to give an even structure of players ahead and behind them in the previous rankings in the first few days, before trying to match up those with more even records and clashes between the highest ranked players in later days. This has two purposes - it ensures that players will normally play someone in the same kind of tournament situation as them to increase the importance of each match, and loading the biggest match ups towards the end of the tournament helps to increase the excitement and hype around the business end. Should a player or players decide to not enter a given tournament, or withdraw midway through for whatever reason, then they are not outright replaced like for like - instead, each day will see players at the top end of the division above get a call up, the result counting in each player's respective division, the bonus for the player moving up being that they're playing for bigger prizes on the day.

- Whoever has the best record in each division wins. If two or more players are tied with the best record, then a playoff match(es) will take place to determine the winner. Following the tournament, players will move up or down the rankings, and up or down divisions, based on their records. Additionally, to take into account the tour card system, players who lose their tour card but don't regain it will be removed from the rankings, and everyone below them slides up a place.

In terms of prize money, this is how I would break it down for top/middle/bottom divisions:

Outright division winner: £50k/£30k/£20k

Individual match win: £1k/£600/£400

Tournament winning record: £60k/£36k/£24k split evenly between the respective players. Should the bottom division run with more than 40 players then the £24k will be reduced to account for more match win prizes needing to be paid.

Sounds complicated? It really isn't, but I'll do a walkthrough of how a typical tournament would operate in a separate post. That said, I hope there's enough explanation there to demonstrate how this would generate a lot of evenly matched content, and give everyone across the 128 a fair chance of having a solid week. Just getting to 4-3 in the bottom division would get you more than two and a half grand, which for a lower tier player isn't bad given that, in the tournaments this would replace, you're probably not qualifying for the Euro Tour and you'd probably need to beat a seed twice in the Pro Tours to do that.

Basho example

WARNING - STILL NO WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP CONTENT IN THIS POST

So let's walk you through how a tournament would work. We'll just do this for the top division - lower divisions, for all intents and purposes, operate in the same way. Let's start with the ranking list as of the last tournament - here I've just taken today's FRH rankings and placed players accordingly:

To demonstrate what happens in the event of someone not taking part, I'm going to pretend Gary Anderson and Ryan Joyce have withdrawn from this event. I'm just maintaining the standard ranking names as used in sumo, which would clearly be anglicised somehow, but from here, let's draw the first two day's matches and simulate it:

Day 1:

Luke Littler 0-2 Jonny Clayton

Luke Humphries 0-2 Michael van Gerwen

James Wade 0-2 Nathan Aspinall

Gian van Veen 1-3 Chris Dobey

Danny Noppert 5-3 Josh Rock

Stephen Bunting 5-3 Damon Heta

Gerwyn Price 3-1 Ryan Searle

Jermaine Wattimena 3-1 Luke Woodhouse

Ross Smith 3-1 Mike de Decker

Martin Schindler 3-1 Cameron Menzies

Wessel Nijman 3-1 Dave Chisnall

Daryl Gurney 3-5 Andrew Gilding

Dirk van Duijvenbode 2-0 Ricardo Pietreczko

Rob Cross 0-2 Ritchie Edhouse

Peter Wright 1-3 Michael Smith

Joe Cullen 2-0 Dimitri van den Bergh

Krzysztof Ratajski 4-2 Martin Lukeman

Raymond van Barneveld 4-6 Kevin Doets (j)

Willie O'Connor 2-0 Niels Zonneveld

Niko Springer 0-2 Scott Williams (j)

Day 2:

Luke Littler 2-0 Martin Schindler

Luke Humphries 0-2 Stephen Bunting

James Wade 2-0 Jermaine Wattimena

Gian van Veen 3-1 Wessel Nijman

Danny Noppert 1-3 Gerwyn Price

Jonny Clayton 0-2 Dirk van Duijvenbode

Michael van Gerwen 2-0 Peter Wright

Josh Rock 2-0 Daryl Gurney

Nathan Aspinall 3-1 Chris Dobey

Ross Smith 6-5 Damon Heta

Mike de Decker 4-2 Ryan Searle

Luke Woodhouse 3-5 Nike Springer

Cameron Menzies 2-0 Raymond van Barneveld

Dave Chisnall 0-2 Krzysztof Ratajski

Rob Cross 2-0 Andrew Gilding

Ricardo Pietreczko 1-3 Joe Cullen

Ritchie Edhouse 0-2 Willie O'Connor

Michael Smith 2-0 Dimitri van den Betgh

Martin Lukeman 2-0 Callan Rydz (j)

Niels Zonneveld 2-0 Brendan Dolan (j)

These are all ordered with the highest ranked player first, and the higher ranked player on the left. You'll notice that most players will have one match on each side of the match list, this will indicate that they've played both someone ranked higher and lower than them. Obviously those right at the top (and bottom) can't do this, and for some other players it can't be helped to give them an easier/harder start, but we can rectify that as we start to schedule based on record as well. Looks like there's only eight players with a 2-0 record already. Those players I have denoted with a (j) have been called up from the division below for that day. The first two days were decided mostly at random, but I'll start scheduling with a bit more thought from now on.

Day 3:

Luke Littler 3-1 Gerwyn Price

Luke Humphries 3-1 Nathan Aspinall

James Wade 0-2 Jonny Clayton

Gian van Veen 4-2 Michael van Gerwen

Danny Noppert 1-3 Chris Dobey

Stephen Bunting 2-0 Ross Smith

Josh Rock 4-2 Mike de Decker

Jermaine Wattimena 2-0 Martin Schindler

Damon Heta 4-2 Rob Cross

Wessel Nijman 3-1 Cameron Menzies

Ryan Searle 5-3 Luke Woodhouse

Daryl Gurney 0-2 Dirk van Duijvenbode

Dave Chisnall 4-2 Michael Smith

Peter Wright 0-2 Willie O'Connor

Andrew Gilding 2-0 Ritchie Edhouse

Ricardo Pietreczko 0-2 Mickey Mansell (j)

Joe Cullen 0-2 Krzysztof Ratajski

Raymond van Barneveld 1-3 Niko Springer

Dimitri van den Bergh 1-3 Ricky Evans (j)

Martin Lukeman 0-2 Niels Zonneveld

This has now resulted in quite a lot of the undefeated players lose today - only Bunting, van Duijvenbode, Ratajski and O'Connor remain with perfect records. Let's keep going on.

Day 4:

Luke Littler (2-1) 0-2 Gian van Veen (2-1)

Luke Humphries (1-2) 2-0 Jonny Clayton (2-1)

James Wade (1-2) 0-2 Josh Rock (2-1)

Danny Noppert (1-2) 5-6 Michael van Gerwen (2-1)

Stephen Bunting (3-0) 6-4 Gerwyn Price (2-1)

Nathan Aspinall (2-1) 0-2 Jermaine Wattimena (2-1)

Chris Dobey (2-1) 0-2 Dirk van Duijvenbode (3-0)

Ross Smith (2-1) 2-0 Martin Schindler (1-2)

Damon Heta (1-2) 3-1 Mike de Decker (1-2)

Wessel Nijman (2-1) 2-0 Ryan Searle (1-2)

Luke Woodhouse (0-3) 0-2 Andrew Gilding (2-1)

Daryl Gurney (0-3) 0-2 Krzysztof Ratajski (3-0)

Cameron Menzies (1-2) 3-1 Willie O'Connor (3-0)

Dave Chisnall (1-2) 6-4 Rob Cross (1-2)

Peter Wright (0-3) 4-2 Jeffrey de Graaf (j)

Ricardo Pietreczko (0-3) 0-2 Ritchie Edhouse (1-2)

Joe Cullen (2-1) 4-2 Michael Smith (2-1)

Raymond van Barneveld (0-3) 2-0 Martin Lukeman (1-2)

Dimitri van den Bergh (0-3) 2-0 Niels Zonneveld (2-1)

Niko Springer (2-1) 3-5 Kevin Doets (j)

So we see Bunting, DvD and Ratajski maintain their perfect record (and lock up winning records) but Ratajski falls off into a big cluster of nine players at 3-1. At the other end three players have now dropped to 0-4. We go again.

Day 5:

Luke Littler (2-2) 2-0 Danny Noppert (1-3)

Luke Humphries (2-2) 1-3 Gerwyn Price (2-2)

James Wade (1-3) 4-2 Gian van Veen (3-1)

Stephen Bunting (4-0) 2-0 Michael van Gerwen (3-1)

Jonny Clayton (2-2) 6-5 Wessel Nijman (3-1)

Josh Rock (3-1) 3-1 Jermaine Wattimena (3-1)

Nathan Aspinall (2-2) 6-5 Ross Smith (3-1)

Chris Dobey (2-2) 0-2 Krzysztof Ratajski (4-0)

Martin Schindler (1-3) 3-1 Mike de Decker (1-3)

Damon Heta (2-2) 2-0 Dirk van Duijvenbode (4-0)

Ryan Searle (1-3) 1-3 Willie O'Connor (3-1)

Luke Woodhouse (0-4) 3-1 Daryl Gurney (0-4)

Cameron Menzies (2-2) 1-3 Dave Chisnall (2-2)

Rob Cross (1-3) 2-0 Peter Wright (1-3)

Andrew Gilding (3-1) 0-2 Joe Cullen (3-1)

Ricardo Pietreczko (0-4) 2-4 Dimitri van den Bergh (1-3)

Ritchie Edhouse (2-2) 5-3 Callan Ryfz (j)

Michael Smith (2-2) 3-1 Scott Williams (j)

Raymond van Barneveld (1-3) 2-0 Niels Zonneveld (2-2)

Martin Lukeman (1-3) 3-1 Niko Springer (2-2)

So Bunting and Ratajski remain unbeaten, and will be given legitimate opponents, while a lot of players have now secured a winning or losing record. Let's go on.

Day 6:

Luke Littler (3-2) 1-3 Stephen Bunting (5-0)

Luke Humphries (2-3) 2-0 James Wade (2-3)

Gian van Veen (3-2) 3-5 Gerwyn Price (3-2)

Danny Noppert (1-4) 5-6 Krzysztof Ratajski (5-0)

Jonny Clayton (3-2) 2-0 Josh Rock (4-1)

Michael van Gerwen (3-2) 2-0 Nathan Aspinall (3-2)

Chris Dobey (2-3) 0-2 Willie O'Connor (4-1)

Jermaine Wattimena (3-2) 6-5 Dirk van Duijvenbode (4-1)

Ross Smith (3-2) 2-4 Cameron Menzies (2-3)

Martin Schindler (2-3) 1-3 Damon Heta (3-2)

Mike de Decker (1-4) 0-2 Joe Cullen (4-1)

Wessel Nijman (3-2) 3-1 Dave Chisnall (3-2)

Ryan Searle (1-4) 6-4 Brendan Dolan (j)

Luke Woodhouse (1-4) 2-0 Peter Wright (1-4)

Daryl Gurney (0-5) 0-2 Ricky Evans (j)

Rob Cross (2-3) 0-2 Niko Springer (2-3)

Andrew Gilding (3-2) 3-5 Michael Smith (3-2)

Ricardo Pietreczko (0-5) 2-0 Raymond van Barneveld (2-3)

Ritchie Edhouse (3-2) 0-2 Niels Zonneveld (2-3)

Dimitri van den Bergh (2-3) 2-0 Martin Lukeman (2-3)

So going into the final day, we have two undefeated players, who'll go against each other for the title. This is also where we chuck as many players on 3-3 against each other as possible to see who ends up with a winning record, which oddly includes both Lukes.

Day 7:

Luke Littler (3-3) 6-5 Luke Humphries (3-3)

James Wade (2-4) 2-4 Gerwyn Price (4-2)

Gian van Veen (3-3) 2-0 Nathan Aspinall (3-3)

Danny Noppert (1-5) 2-0 Jonny Clayton (4-2)

Stephen Bunting (6-0) 3-1 Krzsyztof Ratajski (6-0)

Michael van Gerwen (4-2) 3-1 Josh Rock (4-2)

Chris Dobey (2-4) 3-1 Joe Cullen (5-1)

Jermaine Wattimena (4-2) 2-4 Damon Heta (4-2)

Ross Smith (3-3) 3-1 Wessel Nijman (4-2)

Martin Schindler (2-4) 3-1 Luke Woodhouse (2-4)

Mike de Decker (1-5) 0-2 Willie O'Connor (5-1)

Ryan Searle (2-4) 2-0 Cameron Menzies (3-3)

Daryl Gurney (0-6) 2-0 Michael Smith (4-2)

Dirk van Duijvenbode (4-2) 2-0 Jeffrey de Graaf (j)

Dave Chisnall (3-3) 4-2 Andrew Gilding (3-3)

Rob Cross (2-4) 1-3 Mickey Mansell (j)

Peter Wright (1-5) 4-2 Raymond van Barneveld (2-4)

Ricardo Pietreczko (1-5) 4-2 Martin Lukeman (2-4)

Ritchie Edhouse (3-3) 0-2 Dimitri van den Bergh (3-3)

Niko Springer (3-3) 2-0 Niels Zonneveld (3-3)

This gives final rankings of:

7-0 - Stephen Bunting

6-1 - Krzysztof Ratajski, Willie O'Connor

5-2 - Gian van Veen, Gerwyn Price, Michael van Gerwen, Damon Heta, Dirk van Duijvenbode, Joe Cullen

4-3 - Luke Littler, Jonny Clayton, Josh Rock, Jermaine Wattimena, Ross Smith, Wessel Nijman, Dave Chisnall, Michael Smith, Dimitri van den Bergh, Niko Springer

3-4 - Luke Humphries, Nathan Aspinall, Chris Dobey, Martin Schindler, Ryan Searle, Cameron Menzies, Andrew Gilding, Ritchie Edhouse, Niels Zonneveld

2-5 - James Wade, Danny Noppert, Luke Woodhouse, Rob Cross, Peter Wright, Ricardo Pietreczko, Raymond van Barneveld, Martin Lukeman

1-6 - Mike de Decker, Daryl Gurney

0-0-7 - Gary Anderson, Ryan Joyce

Hence 19 players would split the winning record prize, Bunting would of course claim the champion's pot. The only thing left to do now is to work out the post-tournament rankings. Here' the typical yardstick is to move someone up or down one rank (for these purposes, rank indicates one row on the initial ranking, i.e. each rank has two players, east and west, with the former being technically higher) for each win you have more than losses, or vice versa. However, promotion up to the top ozeki rank has special requirements in sumo (and similarly to the rank of yokozuna above that again), and similarly for relegation from that rank. We're going to assume that Humphries is not already in what they'd call kadoban and will not drop, similarly we're going to assume that nobody is in the spot where they could potentially promote to the top rank based on this tournament's results. Now it can become a bit complicated as you can very easily end up with more than one player at a new rank - indeed in this example, you have four players (van Veen, Bunting, Price and MvG) all with enough wins to get to the top rank you can freely promote to. Hence there is frequently a lot of manual fiddling, often resulting in some players moving up down more or less than expected, although it's usually the case that they will always have you moving somewhat in the right direction. As such, the next ranking might look something like this:

The last three spots indicate players who would have earned promotion from the division below. As we didn't simulate it, I'm just slotting them into the bottom three positions, replacing Lukeman, Zonneveld and van Barneveld, whose records were such that they would normally expect to be relegated. In reality, those promoted might actually have a bit of a higher rank, or those towards the top of the lower divisions might all have losing or otherwise not convincing enough of a record to earn promotion, which might result in a reprieve for one of those three players listed. Anyway, the worlds kick off in a few hours, so back to actual tournaments.

Worlds post 10/8 - the projections bit

Alright, here's what you've all been waiting for, the first round projections. This is basically a data dump, and I've colour coded a lot of it, so here's the explanations as to what is meant by what.

In headers, date and player should be obvious. Short, medium and long are the size of the data. The first is the last three full months (plus whatever is in this month, which for the entire field will be nothing). The second is the last six full months, the last is the last twelve months (data model automatically filters out all results from more than 365 days ago). The composite is the overall projection. For short/medium/long, green indicates at least than 50 winning legs for both players in that time period. Yellow indicates between 20 and 49 winning legs. Red indicates less. For the purposes of calculating the composite score, green numbers are counted in full, yellow counts half, and red is ignored, basically to limit or exclude data samples that are too small to be completely or even partially reliable. As for the coding of the composite score itself, green indicates three greens or two greens and a yellow, and should be very reliable. Yellow indicates individual scores that count for two or one and a half samples, so something like a green and two yellows, one of each. These numbers should still be OK, but proceed with caution. Red numbers indicate where there is less data again and are only included when there is at least one partially reliable dataset to go with. I would NOT use these for any gambling purposes, they are just there for completion. Where we don't have any data or not enough data even on the full sample size, that is indicated. A N/A in the short/medium/long column indicates that the player on the right does not have any data at all in that period. Finally, all numbers are percentage chances to win FOR THE PLAYER ON THE LEFT.

With all that said, here we go:

Worlds post 9/8 - the last 16 bit

Yeah that title is silly, but it's that time of the year. I've picked out who I think will make the last sixteen in each of the previous posts, now let's try and call it from that stage onwards.

Littler 4-1 Cross - Love Rob's game but he's a clear tier below the people that are a clear tier below Littler. He's got enough to win a set maybe so I'll call him to get one, but that I think is probably the limit.

Price 4-3 Dobey - This could be an absolute fantastic game. Price has won it before, Dobey has gone deep before, they're both playing at a very high level, but I think Gerwyn has just that little bit more.

Bunting 4-2 Searle - Ryan's a very good player, but Stephen's just that level above. Not that far above that he'll just shut Searle out, who I think's got more than enough to keep this fairly close, but Stephen has this.

Clayton 4-3 Smith - These two look so evenly matched based on the year long stats, there's basically nothing to choose between the two. Maybe Ross has an explosive set at the right time and nicks it, but I think Clayton's greater experience in these sorts of situations will see him through.

Humphries 4-2 Aspinall - Don't think Luke will be in serious trouble here, Nathan has got a lot, lot closer to his best this season, but his best is going to be a chunk off of Humphries' normal game.

van Veen 4-2 Wade - Gian's just going to keep on rolling here, Wade will probably have a set or two where he's just steady out in fifteen repeatedly and do enough, but van Veen is just a clearly better player.

Wattimena 4-2 O'Connor - Jermaine has just been putting up convincingly better darts in 2025 than Willie has, and I've already been somewhat controversial in putting him through to this stage in the first place. Game will probably be a bit of a lower level than the others, and I think that it'd be swingy enough to stay moderately close.

Rock 4-1 Noppert - There's not many players who would be able to blow apart Danny's high level consistent play. Josh is one of those players and should push on to the quarter finals with relative ease.

Littler 5-3 Price - These have already had one really close game this season at the Grand Prix, and their Players Championship game was also pretty close. Price is one of those players in that group behind Littler, this might be one where it gets to about 2-2 before Luke pulls away.

Bunting 5-3 Clayton - Think that Stephen will properly avenge their Matchplay game here. Jonny is not that far behind statistically, but there's enough of a differential that I can't look past Bunting, almost said 5-2 but I think Clayton might keep it a bit closer.

van Veen 5-4 Humphries - Got to go with the previous results. Luke's got the better numbers, but it's only slightly, so I'm thinking that Gian completely having Humphries' number this season will continue and van Veen pushes through to the semis.

Rock 5-1 Wattimena - If this plays out as it has for Jermaine then it's been a fine run, but this looks about the natural limit, Josh has been in this sort of situation a lot more all year and there is a pretty signifigant difference in numbers, so I think this is the closest we get to a blowout in this round.

Littler 6-2 Bunting - In a repeat of last year's semi final, I think Bunting keeps things a bit closer - but not much closer. That one didn't feel like a 6-1 game, but it's hard to think that if this half goes to seedings that Stephen gets much more out of the game. Maybe 6-3 I could agree with.

Rock 6-4 van Veen - In terms of the raw numbers, these are very close, and in terms of the number of times they've both been deep in majors, it's pretty even as well. More or less can't be separated as third favourite for the tournament either. But I'm thinking that maybe Gian has a harder run catch up to him, and that he's not really done anything at all at this venue prior to this event also catches up to him. Josh has just been around for that little bit longer and I think that counts for just enough.

Littler 7-4 Rock - I really, really cannot look past Luke defending his title (although, as indicated in a previous post, I would not be touching him outright at what is now odds on more or less everywhere). Josh has way too much talent for this to be a blowout, but Luke is on a different level to everyone right now and over a very long format match like this, there is just too long for Littler to be able to rectify things should he get in a hole early.

Next up - round one projections.