Tuesday 13 November 2018

Ian White must really like Thursday nights off work

Honest to god, there's something psychologically wrong with that lad. How you miss that many shots at double I have no idea - he's gone from what was probably a 90% to 95% chance or more of making the Premier League following his European Tour win to being on the outside looking in because he's botched two TV tournaments in a row. I don't know what's going to save it at this stage, you've clearly got van Gerwen, Anderson, Cross, Wright, Suljovic, Wade and Smith in, Price is doing everything a lot better, Whitlock's made a major final, Hopp's made a major semi and won two titles (and, more importantly, is likely a hell of a lot more marketable), Gurney may be there or there abouts, Chisnall hasn't been completely stinking the place up, and that's without mentioning Barney, who cocked it up again tonight. Dear oh dear.

So we've got our last sixteen lineup. Pretty shocked that Harms was able to get by, but that looked a pretty high quality game, Ratajski did the business very efficiently, other than Robson putting up a decent effort in trying to come back, even if it doesn't show statistically, I don't think there's a great deal to talk about. So, what do the matches project as? Let's take a look:

Bunting/van den Bergh - 39/61. It's giving Dimitri a bit more of a chance than the market thinks. This seems somewhat fine as stage Dimitri and floor Dimitri are two different animals, but there's not a great deal in the overall points per turn and with Bunting playing some really good stuff in the group stages, I'm tempted to pass this one.

Price/Payne - 63/37. Price is a lot shorter of a favourite on this one, and rightly so as he's in red hot form. If I take it from after the break it's nearer 70/30 - which kills any edge we'd have on a Payne bet almost completely. Gerwyn should get past this one you'd think but Payne's not going to make it easy.

Cross/Suljovic - 58/42. There's not even a point in the season long points per turn thanks to Mensur being a heck of a lot more consistent when he's losing, and the projections as always only consider legs completed, i.e. won, with Cross 4/5 and Mensur 6/5 if you reign in Suljovic a couple of points due to consistency then there's little to be had here.

Wright/Whitlock - 63/37. Line's bang on Wright being a 2-1 favourite. Do we bet Simon? There's nearly enough edge there, Wright's not put up hugely convincing conventional numbers, Whitlock's already on a free hit after coming through that thriller against Price where he needed four straight to survive, and he beat Wright over a same length match in the previous major. What the heck, 0.25u Whitlock 2/1.

Anderson/Harms - 94/6. Taking that with a pinch of salt, Harms' stats come from only 34 won legs. That said, saying Anderson is anything other than a prohibitive favourite would be comical.

Wade/Unterbuchner - 82/18. Wade's 1/4, so this looks in the right ballpark. With Wade having the level of confidence he does at the moment it's really, really hard to recommend taking the German lad without a much bigger edge, it's only really missed doubles by White that's allowed him to advance rather than Unterbuchner doing anything truly outstanding, only breaking a conventional average of 90 against Hine.

Clayton/Ratajski - 46/54. More or less exactly how the odds line up, so there's not going to be anything here. As an aside, it's now annoying that Kciuk is in my database and steals Ratajski's autocomplete when adding new data. This should be really very tight and a probable tie of the round. That said...

van Gerwen/Smith - 73/27. Smith's 7/2, which might be a tempter, then again van Gerwen has made Smith to look very silly in multiple games this season, winning their Premier League initial stage matches 14-3, the final 11-4, two Euro Tour semis 14-2 with just the one 8-4 win for Smith in the event in Shanghai he won. If Smith had been doing anything god mode style in the group stage I might have thought about it, but he really hasn't.

So that's your lot. One bet. Oh well, it is what it is.

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