Day 2 bets

Tempted with Hughes. Worked out that it's O'Connor that's breaking oddschecker, so it's only showing Hughes at 4/6. Season long that looks about right, but since the restart Hughes has looked a lot better, maybe as much as a three in four favourite. Only concern is that O'Connor is really on a freeroll, he shouldn't be here and now has a confidence boosting win that'll help him see how far he gets. Will pass and probably regret it.

0.5u Petersen 1/3, this looks safe enough. Kleermaker's competent, but Devon's a tier above, probably several - should win this near 85% of the time since the restart, even nearer to 90% season long. Got to go with the form here.

Nothing on the de Sousa game. It's close to a Clayton bet, we can get 6/4 and he's above 45% season long, but only a couple of percentage points above the bet being break even since the restart, so the edge isn't quite there.

Also very tempted on Wade. The odds are only 11/8 though, which is probably a reaction to Aspinall's poor performance yesterday, Wade's in the high 40's season long to win this and effectively a flip since the restart, this is a gun to head bet on James, but fortunately our police state isn't quite there yet so we can pass on this one.

van Duijvenbode is one that I thought would be a bet given that all the stats I have on any time period give him a little over 40%, but he's already as short at 11/8 which is a little bit surprising, do they know something about Michael that we don't?

Price/Wright is up as a coinflip. Year long, yep, that's right, neither player I see as better than 51%. After the restart Price is a fair bit better, up in the mid to high 50's, but we only get the 10/11 side on Gerwyn, so I think I can reluctantly pass this one. If you see him win the darts then take it maybe?

0.1u White 10/3, going low as there's something about White that doesn't seem quite right, but even since the restart when he's seemingly not played quite at his best, he's still over a one in three shot. Season long it's even more. Also leaning low because Michael looked GOOD yesterday, which is a real change, that and it's a longer format TV game, and in Germany where the crowd has rustled Ian fairly recently.

Nothing on the Suljovic game. This looks like a standard West wins one in three shot (there's a difference in quality, but it's not as much as you'd think), West is just longer than 2/1, so nothing doing here.

Back for the quarters later.

Day 1 winners thoughts

Just going to blast through these, thank fuck that Hopp missed those match darts

Hughes - Played OK. Pulled out the best leg when it was most needed. Scraped over the line but can't really complain, was up against a tough opponent playing well.

West - Lucky. Ratajski missed a bunch of critical doubles, particularly in the mid game, Steve did enough but will need to up his game.

White - Meh. King didn't really show up, White didn't need to get out of second gear, three six-visit breaks is a nice bonus to be able to get.

de Sousa - Nine. Nice. Was a touch worrying when de Zwaan got back into the game a little bit, but thankfully Jose was 5-1 up at the time. Generally solid, but could do with cutting out the couple of bad legs he had.

Wade - Fortunate. Performance was sound, but as I kind of thought in the preview, Lennon had his shots to claim it and missed them.

Petersen - Competent. Hamilton never really troubled him. Can't really fault the performance but it certainly wasn't peak Devon.

Smith - Sluggish. Took forever to start, hit his game just about enough to get back on throw late in the game then kind of fell over the line as Ross's scoring against the throw fell apart. Maybe a good sign that Michael got through the first round, should come into it more in a longer match.

van Duijvenbode - Alright. For a 6-0 win it wasn't quite as amazing as it could have been, just the three par legs and the three in six visits. Good timing I guess, Noppie was on or around a double in every leg but only actually got a couple of pokes at them.

Aspinall - Must try harder. Lots and lots of sloppy darts and missed darts at doubles, fortunate that Kuivenhoven was equally off their game, could have been 4-1 at the break to Maik very easily.

O'Connor - Good. Cullen was really disappointing, the #1 seed seemed to get to him and Willie getting the comedy leg going into the break seemed to crush him. Plenty of things Willie could work on, but at least he has the opportunity.

Kleermaker - Composed. First leg was a bit lol but was able to pin quite a few big outs to open up a good lead against Cross then take advantage of misses in what turned out to be the final leg.

Clayton - Phew. Should really have been 5-0 and away after the break, needed to rely on mistakes from Hopp, was scoring real well in the legs Hopp won to be fair.

van Gerwen - Clinical. Never gave Labanauskas a sniff outside the one leg he hit a twelve in. Ominous signs that Michael could have shaken off the flaky form of late.

Price - Up there. Probably only the third leg that you can really criticise, which he won anyway and probably could have used another six darts to do so. No real signs of weakness beyond there and should still be considered the favourite if he can get past the next round.

Wright - Great. Apart from one leg never gave Clemens a chance. Was right there in the holds Gabriel was able to hit down, but this made all three of the big guns show up on day 1.

Suljovic - Did enough. Didn't really need to do that much against Gurney playing like that, but was hitting enough doubles and scoring just well enough.

So tomorrow we have, in some order, O'Connor/Hughes, Aspinall/Wade, Petersen/Kleermaker, van Gerwen/White, Price/Wright, Suljovic/West, de Sousa/Clayton and Smith/van Duijvenbode. There's one obvious stand out game, but I don't think there's anything that's going to be a particular stinker, West/Suljovic looks the least interesting on paper but if West can get by Ratajski, then he can certainly trouble Mensur. Aspinall/Wade (again lol) probably the second pick, Clayton/de Sousa should be fine if Jonny can finish things a bit better, van Gerwen/White will be alright if Ian can roll things back a year or so, Smith/van Duijvenbode ought to be excellent, O'Connor/Hughes is one where anything can happen, and Petersen/Kleermaker has potential if Martijn can perform like he did today, he's had enough good performances of late that it can happen.

Bets in the morning.

Euros preview

Will go through section by section:

A few interesting games here, but let's go through one by one. Cullen against O'Connor is one where maybe Willie is happy just to be here, given he was the last man out prior to Durrant withdrawing? Joe's certainly the form player, and ought to be the favourite - if you look on 2020 as a whole, Willie might be value, as he had the much better early start to the season - running about 40-45% against Cullen, but since the restart it's more like a 3-1 edge for Cullen. The odds are somewhere in the middle, oddschecker is a bit funky in this one, but Cullen's around 1/2 so I'm fine to pass this one. Won't argue if you want to go with Joe though.

Hughes/Chisnall ought to be fun. We've not talked about Hughes much recently on here, certainly nowhere near as much as early last season where he actually binked a Euro Tour (which would have got him seeded for everything this year, which is nice), but clearly still a very dangerous player, if a bit inconsistent. Same with Chizzy really, although I think Dave's got a better floor game (in terms of worst he'll play, not off TV) and a comparable peak which he probably hits more often. Chizzy a bit better than 60% in the market, I think this is close to a Hughes punt in that he's around 45% no matter what I look at. 13/8 isn't quite tempting enough, maybe if he drifts a bit we can go with it.

Aspinall/Kuivenhoven's one that could have been a lot more fun if it took place earlier in the year when Maik was playing better stuff, he's not been bad but he certainly started 2020 a bit better than how he's playing round about now. Aspinall's going to be tough to beat, it's pretty rare that you see a bad game from Nathan, and the market price of 2/7 on Aspinall looks accurate enough to me. Maybe Maik has a little bit more chance than that, but it's not enough to look at a punt though.

Wade/Lennon's the last game - I'm never sure what to make of Steve, his figures have been competent all year but it's not really translated into results, so could be a bit under the radar. James is somewhat like Aspinall, very consistent, will not give away easy legs, but probably lacking the explosive peak game that the true top level players have. Very close to a Lennon bet, he's 2/1 and slightly over 40% in my projections season long, this drops about 3% since the restart, which is just about enough to make me avoid taking the shot, that and a general lack of results, wouldn't surprise me if he gets close here but misses an opportunity to get close to, or over, the finish line.

First round games here aren't too interesting. Hamilton's likely just happy to be here after a huge absence from the PDC TV stage, creeping in with a good run in the final event, but Petersen's different gravy right now, should have no problems. Devon's rated at near 80% in the market, this seems close season long, oddly enough the Hammer is rating as a better than one in three chance after the restart, but he suffers from enormous consistency issues, scoring over 11 points a turn better when winning compared to losing (in comparison, Devon is at 3 in the same timeframe). Projections don't take into account losing legs, so it won't show where he's just given legs away.

Cross/Kleermaker is the second game, Martijn's had some alright performances recently, while Cross is looking to re-establish himself in the upper tiers of the game, at least behind the big three. Cross is of course the defending champion, while he's not defending the ranking points, he is defending the title, so a bit to prove here. Cross is ranked around 70/30, I think he's got a bit more of a chance here - would set the line at 1/3, so 4/9 is real close to value.

van Gerwen/Labanauskas is a worlds rematch, there's plenty of questions over MvG after he's failed to win any of these titles, but is at least the number 5 seed after getting the most money of anyone that hasn't won yet. Darius has his work cut out regardless though - he's a live dog for sure, anyone that's in the field at least stands a chance, but the 4/1 line looks pretty much spot on to me.

King/White is easily the most interesting match of the first round in this section, King only just being the underdog at 6/5 in the market. Seems pretty clear that King's played his better stuff since the restart, while White's played the better prior to it - season long, White's projecting at 63%, but since the restart, it's King with the advantage at 57%. I'm loathed to bet against White more or less any time, but there's certainly a very strong argument to take odds against on Mervyn in this one. I'll pass on it - more data is better data, and Ian is actually still scoring more overall - the projections saying Mervyn coming from five points more inconsistency for King.

Not really much to say about game one, Kim only just snuck into the field (having one of the four events being in Belgium and getting a free ticket into the event is a useful talent to have) and is running into the form player in the world. Price is 1/4, that looks bang on the money season long, on form since the restart I think there's a realistic argument that it could be even shorter in the 1/6 region.

Wright/Clemens is fun, if only because I really want to see a Price/Wright worlds rematch. Clemens is certainly a very dangerous player in his own right, and as one of the two strong German contingent, has a bit of an edge he may not usually have. Market's giving Clemens a 25% shot, which appears in the right ballpark. It'd certainly be a breakthrough win, we all know how good Clemens has been but I think he's still lacking a statement victory, at least on the TV stage.

Suljovic/Gurney ought to be a good watch, Mensur's looking like he's regaining a little bit of form, while Gurney's always going to be tough to beat, even if he may be a little bit off his best form in recent months. The bookies can't separate these two, and I can't put much between them either - this does promise to be extremely close, I think the Austrian has the tiniest of tiny edges, and as he's on the shorter side of the 10/11 against evens line, we can move on.

Ratajski's yet another really strong player in what's an incredibly spicy quarter, and he'll come up against Steve West who's dropped down the ranking a fair bit, and certainly isn't at the levels of a couple of years ago where he was regularly making TV events. Ratajski is at around 70/30 in terms of market line, that looks about right to me, yet another quarter where there's no value.

First up here we've got one of the four event winners from this year in de Sousa, he'll take on de Zwaan who's had injury issues for a lot of the year and, much like West, doesn't seem quite at the levels he was at a couple of years prior where he was running really deep in TV majors. The market's still respecting Jeffrey's game some what, but I'm not, 0.5u de Sousa 4/9, Jose's better than that season long, but since the restart he's got such a superior record that he's rated to win this game nearer to 95% of the time than 90%. This looks an extremely safe punt at a good price, I'm almost tempted to go a full unit here.

Clayton's up next against the other German contender in Max Hopp, and we've got our second bet here - 0.5u Clayton 4/6. Max simply isn't in the same league as Jonny is - sure he's at home and he has his moments, but Clayton's made a final on the Euro Tour since the restart, has an event win like Hopp, and is one of the most underrated players on the circuit. Season long this looks more like an 80/20, Hopp improves slightly since the restart, but still doesn't project to even a one in four chance. Getting 4/6 is incredibly generous.

Smith-off here between Michael and Ross, Ross doing enough in the final event to claim a spot, so is hitting a nice bit of form coming into this. The market seems to have wised up, or are maybe sleeping a bit on Michael, who's gone a bit of time since doing anything in all honesty, I looked at the projections saying Ross would be a fair price of 6/4, then I looked at the odds and they're exactly the same. Oh well.

Finally we have the only all-Dutch game between Noppert and van Duijvenbode, Danny continues to be slept on as an incredibly dangerous player, while Dirk's made a major final extremely recently to completely ruin the underrated vibe we've had on him since he started 2020 in red hot fashion. When there's two players we think are undervalues it usually offsets, season long we think Noppert 55/45, since the restart it's more like 60/40, Noppert is 4/6, so nothing more here.

Disappointingly just the two punts, but regular readers will know we don't just spew money around just because there's games we could bet on. Let's just hopefully take what look like a couple of very safe plays and then re-evaluate tomorrow night for round two.

Wait what, Cullen? Really?

Hmm, interesting winner there, as Joe Cullen binks a second Euro Tour title, and with it the most unexpected #1 seed for a major event in history. He played well, particularly on doubles where he wasn't missing a thing, so credit where it's due. MvG got the runner up spot, although Suljovic will surely be annoyed at missing four match darts in the semi.

Few tasty matches for Oberhausen - Hughes/Chisnall, King/White, Wright/Clemens, Suljovic/Gurney, Noppert/van Duijvenbode and Clayton/Hopp look to be the picks of it. Will put up some full projections. Irritating that the PDC, amongst others, continues to report that Durrant has a "positive Covid-19 test", that's not what it looks for, but that's right down the list of my priorities in worldwide in terms of Covid fuckups.

New FRH rankings:

1 Michael van Gerwen

2 Peter Wright

3 Gerwyn Price

4 Rob Cross

5 Dimitri van den Bergh

6 Michael Smith (UP 2)

7 Nathan Aspinall (DOWN 1)

8 Glen Durrant (DOWN 1)

9 Dave Chisnall

10 Daryl Gurney

11 Gary Anderson

12 Ian White

13 James Wade

14 Krzysztof Ratajski

15 Joe Cullen (UP 2)

16 Mensur Suljovic (DOWN 1)

17 Simon Whitlock (DOWN 1)

18 Jonny Clayton

19 Adrian Lewis

20 Danny Noppert (NEW)

Smith's semi final, along with Durrant's non-participation, sees him jump back up a couple of spots, while Noppert hitting the quarters sees him into the top 20 at the expense of Chris Dobey, for what I think is the first time. Ross Smith is into the top 45, Scott Baker hits the top 70, Hamilton and Noguera are in the top 128, while surprise package Franz Roetzsch (please get in the German Superleague next season) is up to #163.

Surprise result from Russia with Koltsov not winning the qualifier for the worlds, instead Dmitriy Gorbunov, who had a 2-4 record at Q-School with a 69 overall average, manages to get the spot. Could be one that players will be hoping to draw.

Back in the next couple of days with some Oberhausen previewing I guess.

ET4 day 3

Well day 2 didn't have the finish we wanted, with both Jose de Sousa and Ian White inexplicably losing, which more than wiped out everything we'd made from getting Andy Hamilton and Franz Rötzsch over the line, the other bet (Lowe) losing in a decider, so really disappointing. Into day 3 now, a few players that need to win to get in the Euros, let's take a look:

van Gerwen/Hamilton - The Hammer looks to be in barring a very weird set of results, so doesn't really have pressure on here against MvG, but I can't really see a bet here - we can get 5/1 which isn't that much better than what it should be, maybe if van Gerwen's scoring remains as pedestrian as it was against Razma yesterday Andy's got a chance, but I don't think so.

Wade/Aspinall - We had this one this time last week as well, such is the way the seedings have worked out, yesterday Wade had no problems with Harrysson in a pretty poor match, while Aspinall needed every leg to take down Jason Lowe, who knows what'd have happened if Jason didn't miss those two darts to break at 4-4. Aspinall's the favourite, price is basically the same as last week, and so is the analysis, except here there's the added disincentive to take Wade given a middling performance on Saturday.

Ratajski/Rötzsch - Can Franz book his ticket to the Euros from nowhere? It'd be a remarkable achievement given ten days ago I had no idea who he was. Ratajski will probably be a step too far though, Krzysztof was very good in avenging the loss to Kleermaker yesterday, and we're only getting 10/3 today as opposed to 9/2 yesterday, so given that Ratajski can in no way be considered a worse player than Cross, we can pass on this one.

Suljovic/Hughes - Dartsdata fucked up yet again (why oh why don't the PDC use Dart Connect at least as a backup), Carl and others were able to put together the numbers from Mensur's deciding leg win over Clemens, very nice performance again, Jamie got through a scrappy affair with Steve West and is probably thankful for West missing a bunch of doubles. This is another redo from last week, and another no bet just like last week - Suljovic being a minor favourite in the market appears accurate enough.

Smith/Hopp - Ross rallied from a big hole to defeat Gerwyn Price in a decider, while Hopp pulled off the big upset against de Sousa, probably Hopp's best result in years. Hopp is in Oberhausen but Smith needs the win here to get there, market has Hopp as a tiny dog but probably should be a bit longer - 0.25u Smith 8/11, Ross has played some really good stuff this weekend, projects as a 2-1 favourite and has big incentives to reach the quarters here.

Chisnall/Cullen - This would be one more redo, if Chizzy hadn't lost to Labanauskas last week that is. Chizzy put in a big average against Meulenkamp and should be very dangerous, Cullen also got into three figures in a routine win over Marijanovic, and comes into this one with a bit more than a 40% chance in the market. That looks about right to me, no incentive to go either way here.

Noguera/Smith - Jesus got the huge win over Ian White to keep his Oberhausen chances alive, Smith's another tough out, Michael cruising to a 6-2 win over Schindler yesterday. Nearly enough value to go with Smith here, but not quite given Noguera should have the extra bit of confidence and motivation given what's at stake if he can just put out one more good game.

Baker/Noppert - Final game, Scott was able to put out Daryl Gurney with less than a 90 average, inflated by a twelve darter to ice the match 6-3, Noppert averaged 13 points more in defeating Adrian Lewis by the same score. Open section for Noppert is, who has as good a chance as anyone in this half, he's a big favourite in the market, shorter than 1/2, which actually seems about right - that's just how good Danny is playing right now.

So just the one bet on Smudger, let's hope Hopp can't repeat any of last night's heroics.

ET4 day 2

Fairly unremarkable day 1, all I'll say about the Lewis game is that we should have bet on Marijanovic at any price just out of general principle and that this didn't occur to me at the time is a glaring omission, Ross Smith looked great, Franz Rötzsch looked more than competent for a second straight week and picked up a good win over a solid opponent in Brendan Dolan, Kuivenhoven had a bit of an off day, Kleermaker got away with one while Benito continues to struggle. Let's pile into day 2:

Hughes/West - Good win for Steve that, taking out Alcinas with both players scoring comfortably into the mid 90's, West was threatening to drop out of the FRH top 50 if he didn't take that one. Bookies think this will be quite close but have Hughes as the favourite, I tend to agree with that assessment, I've got Jamie as having slightly better chances than the market indicates (thinking around 60/40), so it's close to a punt.

Lewis/Noppert - Tough one for Lewis this. Needs a result to have any chance of getting to Oberhausen, and Noppert is probably the toughest draw he could have got. Danny, who easily brushed aside Sebastian Pohl, is the market favourite and probably one of the most underrated players on the tour. This seems similar to the last one, I'm thinking Noppert is about a 60/40 favourite, so given the line it's close, but we'll pass again.

Smith/Schindler - Martin's into the second round after defeating Tytus Kanik in a game that was probably closer than the scoreline suggests, the Pole missing darts at double in three legs and being waiting on double in a couple more - obviously the only out he got was 170... Smith's a huge favourite, I was thinking this might be a shot for a small play on Schindler, but his 2020 form isn't matching his 2019 form where he was probably the best player to not make the worlds, Smith being 2/7 seems accurate enough.

Cullen/Marijanovic - Joe's nearly a 75/25 favourite in the market. There's not much data at all on Robert, but this has the feeling of being fair, I'm half tempted to take a shot on Robert given that he did average 99 yesterday, but I'll pass on it given Joe's showed some signs that he might be returning to form on occasion.

Gurney/Baker - Scott got past Unterbuchner, who was misfiring a little but was still able to get it to 4-4 before Baker put the game to bed, and he now has a tougher test in Daryl Gurney. Baker's 5/2, this seems close to spot on, I've got him closer to a one in four shot than one in three, but no value on either side in this one.

Chisnall/Meulenkamp - Big game for Ron this, a win should punch his ticket to the Euros as he currently stands on the bubble, he got through a scrappy game against Michael Rosenauer where he missed 24 darts at double which he'll have to tighten up. Line again looks accurate, I punched this into the computer and saw Ron with a 32% shot - thought there might be value but no, he's 2/1, let's keep going.

Wade/Harrysson - Andreas was one of the surprise packages yesterday, taking out Benito van de Pas with a sub-80 average. Can't see that troubling Wade in the slightest (Harrysson was actually over 40% on doubles so it's not like the averages are low because they missed a ton), 1/7 really isn't appealing however. Stick it as a banker if you want.

Cross/Rötzsch - Tempting one this, Franz got past Dolan with a 93 average, 6/12 on doubles, wasn't bad last week either. Cross is massively better than anyone he'll have ever faced, but we're getting a good price here - 0.1u Rötzsch 9/2, is it really that outrageous to say he'll nick this 20% of the time? I don't think so given how he's played in the last couple of weeks.

Ratajski/Kleermaker - Into the evening session and we get a redo from last Saturday where Kleermaker was a surprisingly easy winner. Martijn took out Ballaj after Arsen missed six match darts, so is probably lucky to be here. Krzysztof is 1/3, and this does seem like a 75/25 encounter, so no bets here.

Bunting/Hamilton - Stephen's got into the seeds somehow, and faces the former world finalist who did what he needed to do against a domestic qualifier, nothing great from Andy but we know what he's been able to do in the past. We've got an alright price here - 0.25u Hamilton 12/5, Andy is correctly priced as an underdog, but the computer's spitting out that he's got about a 40% chance - that's enough of an edge to grab this price here.

Aspinall/Lowe - Possible game of the night here, Jason's had a great 2020 and got through a decider against Scott Marsh who looked very impressive, Jason needs a win to keep Oberhausen chances alive, so a huge game in his career really. Exactly the same spot as the previous game - 0.25u Lowe 9/4, this looks more like a 60/40 than something that Nathan will win more than two times out of three, enough of an edge to go with it.

Suljovic/Clemens - Gabriel looked very solid in beating a domestic qualifier 6-1 with a near ton average, and now comes up against Mensur in what could also be a highlight of the evening. The line looks just about right, if anything it might be favouring Clemens a bit more than it should, but meh, game in Germany makes it right enough of the time.

van Gerwen/Razma - Not a great game for Madars against Kai Fan Leung, neither could really score that heavily, he'll need to up it tonight but we know he can put together runs of twelve darters and get two or three legs in no time at all. Almost worth a punt on Madars. I see him as having slightly less than a one in four shot, we're getting 5/1, if this was eighteen months ago we probably get 7/1 and go with it, but it's 2020, so no.

Price/Smith - Ross had the performance of the day yesterday with a bonkers 112 average in a drubbing of Mario Longname, the Belgian not playing badly at all but having no answer to that level of performance. Now he faces probably the form player in all the world, if he repeats that performance he wins, but is it really sustainable? Looking at the computer, this should probably be 5/2 Smith rather than 2/1, if you think that he can do that again for another twenty minutes then don't let me stop you betting.

de Sousa/Hopp - This one should be fun, Max got his best result in a while with a 6-1 win over Klaasen, but faces the most recent champion in de Sousa and enters as a near 3/1 dog. That is accurate - in fact, it's probably overstating his chances, 0.5u de Sousa 1/3, the computer's reckoning that a fair line should be 1/5, so taking half a unit on Jose looks good here.

White/Noguera - Final match, Jesus took every leg against Kuivenhoven without really hitting top gear, average was around 90 which you think would need to go up against Ian. I think we can take the favourite again here, 0.5u White 4/11, again the computer thinks the favourite has a lot more chances than the market suggests, this ought to be closer to 1/6.

There we have it, back tomorrow morning with the last sixteen.

Briefly on ET4

I have no recommended bets - mainly because there's so many domestic qualifiers I have no idea where to start on any of them. There's eight. Which is a lot. Chuck in knowing little about Harryson or Marsh, having very little read on Vandenboegaerde right now, similarly with Kanik, it's hard to call much of anything at all. There's only really Razma/KFL and Hopp/Klaasen that we can get much of a real read on, with the other games involving card holders featuring two Spaniards who missed much of the season. Check back early on Saturday for round 2.