That was beautiful. One of those rare days when nothing can go wrong, even when Nico Kurz tries his best to make things go wrong. All four bets came home, I guess the most surprising one was the Hunt bet - not so much in that it came in by itself, as the only one that was odds against that was always going to be the biggest surprise, it was more the manner in which he did it, Heta didn't get close. Suppose the only other real surprise outside of our bets was Ricardo Pietreczko steamrollering a somewhat out of sorts Luke Woodhouse.
Onto day 2, let's get straight into it:
Gurney/Kuivenhoven - I think if this game was taking place in April I'd have gone with Maik. For now, he didn't do quite enough against Worsley to make me think he's a recommendable punt at 3/1. It's not a bad play per se, I think he's got around a 30% shot, maybe ever so slightly more, I just don't think there's quite the edge there on present form.
White/Waites - This one looks pretty close to the mark. Season long I've got Ian at 65%, Waites is 15/8, so that's as close to on the money as you're going to get. I do wonder though, Scott's looked alright in some of the more recent events, and I get the nagging feeling that White, although still in the world's elite, has possibly already hit the highest he's ever going to get (he is north of 50 after all), and hasn't been at his peak for a while. No bets, but wouldn't be surprised if Scott's able to nick this one.
Smith/Telnekes - That's not quite tempting enough a price on Derk there. Smith's 2/9, I'm seeing the game at around 80/20. Derk's performance was a little sluggish early against Marijanovic, if he does that again he could easily be 4-0 down and out of the running against someone with Michael's quality. Not a great deal of interest in this one.
Durrant/Kurz - Can't recommend a play on this one either. The newest Premier League champion is rated as slightly better than 75/25 in the market, which is more or less where I see the game at as well. It'll be an interesting game for Nico, he's got all the potential in the world, could this be a statement win? It'll be tough against someone with the consistency of Glen to say the least, but he does have the peak game to possibly cause an upset.
de Sousa/Pietreczko - Jose's a huge favourite here, which seems fine, Ricardo got through a tough first round opponent despite only getting the one leg in five visits, but Jose's a step up in class again and I really can't see de Sousa having any problems. 1/6 doesn't tempt me though.
Chisnall/Labanauskas - Line makers are too good right now. I've got Darius as having more or less exactly a one in three shot, he's 21/10. Darius was steady against Unterbuchner, who had all the flashy moments (I think he had a 10 darter in there somewhere?) but couldn't put together the steady legs. Chisnall will know if Labanauskas plays at his best he'll have a game on his hands, but Dave ought to be good enough here.
Cullen/Huybrechts - Kim is someone I should have bet on yesterday on gut feeling, I trusted the numbers, and sure enough Henderson did very little, allowing Huybrechts to coast home without really getting out of second gear. Cullen's a step up in quality but the market is still thinking that Kim has almost a 40% chance to take this. That's pretty much exactly how I see it as well, so yet more no bets.
Hughes/Lennon - Steve looked pretty good against Madars Razma in the opening round, and has been quietly playing alright all season despite not getting the results, so I thought there might have been a bit of value here - I've got Steve as only a slight dog. And he's 13/10 in the market. Move on to the evening session it is then.
Ratajski/Kleermaker - Not a chance I'm betting this one. Kleermaker looked bad yesterday. Buffler you can understand, it's a Euro Tour debut and he's come out of left field a bit but Martijn just couldn't hit doubles. I'm seeing him at under 25% at the best of times, so 3/1 isn't the slightest bit interesting. Should be a comfortable win for Krzysztof even if Martijn does regress to the mean in quality.
Cross/Hunt - Now come on here. Adam was 12/5 against Damon Heta, and he's only 2/1 against Cross? It was a nice performance, but I wouldn't have thought that's enough to make him shorter, unless they actually think Heta is better than Cross at this stage... who knows. In any case, Hunt is underrated, but not betting at 2/1 underrated. Would have stabbed at 3/1.
Wade/Clemens - Apart from installment four of Price/Petersen, this is probably the most interesting match of the night. Wade is 8/11, which feels about right. He's actually coming up as closer to 8/15 in terms of a fair price from projections, but let's factor in that I've got the German Superleague in my dataset (where Clemens didn't play well), Clemens has homefield, and Clemens looked better than he's done for months yesterday. All things combined and I'm fine with not betting this one.
Price/Petersen - I am fine with a bet here though, 0.25u Petersen 13/8. Devon's that good right now that despite Gerwyn winning everything in sight, including a big major title, Devon's got legitimate chances to win this one, as he did on the way to winning the previous Euro Tour event. I've got Devon as just the wrong side of a 51/49, so 13/8? Yes please.
Suljovic/Evans - David didn't let us down yesterday, although Kai followed up that very nice final qualifying game and looked a lot better than he did in the Superleague, so let's see if he can get into ET4 and get a more favourable draw. Suljovic is a huge step up in class, the market however has adjusted to Evans enough that it's only slightly better than 60/40 for Mensur. I think that's a little bit too much of an overreaction, and it's very close - it's only the vig that's stopping me. The prices are 4/7 and 6/4, I've got Mensur at 70%. If someone throws out 4/6, take it.
van Gerwen/King - Think the days of auto-laying MvG are gone. King is only 3/1. He's got course and distance recently, I don't think he should be quite that long, but we're only talking 5/2 being about right, so no real underdog value.
Aspinall/O'Connor - Oddschecker is being a bit funky here, only showing a price for Aspinall, and he's shorter than 1/3 against Willie, who got past Chris Dobey in a scrappy game. That's probably a bit too short, O'Connor has better chances (I'd price around 4/9, maybe 2/5), but his first round display didn't fill me with confidence at all, he only really had a couple of good legs and that's it.
van der Voort/Hopp - Not quite sure how Vincent is a seed, but these are strange times. Hopp was good enough yesterday that, along with the German crowd, I can shy away from a Vincent bet. Can't blame anyone if you want to take 10/11, van der Voort isn't exactly playing badly and is up in the high 50% range season long, but I think there's enough external factors in this match that I can avoid recommending a bet.
So, just Petersen really. Back tomorrow morning, should quickly congratulate Lisa Ashton on getting through the qualifier to the Slam, will be paying a bit of attention to the Women's Series in terms of worlds reads.
