Post-Christmas now, and we're really filtering the field down now - 30% will go today, over 40% tomorrow, then it halves down from there. Six games today, closing out the round of 32 and getting our first couple of quarter finalists, what do we like here?
Whitlock v King - Enormous amount of experience on show here. Combined age of over 100, but both players still going strong in the top 20 in the world, although while Whitlock appears to be trending downwards to some degree, King's staying at a good level and getting decent TV results. Whitlock had few troubles with Harry Ward in the first round, whereas Mervyn got into a swingy match against Ciaran Teehan, just coming through in a deciding set. The market can barely separate them, having King only just over evens and Whitlock just the other side. I think I can avoid this one, although Mervyn is very tempting - he's close to around 60/40, fluctuating down to around 55/45 over longer samples, but from around the Matchplay onwards, it's closer to 50/50, and with King there's always the underlying question of whether he can hold out physically for what's now a best of seven match.
Gurney v Durrant - Now here's the match of the third round, although there's plenty of games that have put down markers that'll prove hard to beat. Neither dropped a set in the opening round, both averaged around the same, and the market can't split the two. I think I have to go with 0.25u Durrant 19/20, I've talked about Gurney having a consistency advantage, but against Durrant, who's also very much on the better side of that metric (against a database-wide season long sample of 4.9, Daryl is at 2.2 to Glen's 3.1), I think a bunch of that underrating in the projections, which go of winning legs, is negated, and Glen's higher overall scoring will see him get home here just enough that we have an edge on the game. Heck, from after the Matchplay, Glen's consistency is actually better than Daryl's, so we'll definitely go with it.
Dobey v Sherrock - The entirely of this match comes down to two questions, given that Dobey is not that far off the quality of player that Fallon's already beaten. I'm ignoring the crowd being one-sided dicks, as that's taken for granted. The first is whether Fallon can keep this going over an extended best of seven length, which is uncharted territory for her. We just don't know, but we have to assume she will have prepared for it. The second is whether she can keep pinning what Burton was saying as a large number of doubles last dart in hand - by the looks of things, nine from the eleven she hit were with the last dart. That seems unsustainable. Big questions, and while her winning points per turn is actually higher than Dobey's, the overall points per turn is about four points lower, so with the line being 9/2, I think there's no real value in the game. Chris should win, Fallon isn't without chances, but the chances are, in my eyes, correctly evaluated.
Price v Henderson - Gerwyn will be hoping he's not dragged into such a tight game as he was in his opening round against O'Connor (oh, what would have happened if Willie didn't miscount in the tiebreak), while Henderson will be hoping that Price continues to play a bit below par and that he can throw to the level he did against James Richardson in his first game straight sets win. The line is about the same as the Dobey/Sherrock line, which I think is fair enough. The projections I have are putting Price in the low to mid 80% range of chances to round off the last sixteen lineup, so I can't see any true value here.
Anderson v Aspinall - Into round four and we get, unless both Price and Whitlock advance earlier, the only last sixteen match featuring two top sixteen seeds, both having fairly similar routes - easy enough game in round two (Aspinall's looked easier on paper but, with how their opponents played, was tougher on the actual oche), while both got into a 4-3 battle in round three, Ando needing to come from behind as Searle's game collapsed, whereas Nathan needed to see off a roaring comeback from Krzysztof Ratajski. Ando's scored ever so slightly more in this tournament than Nathan, Aspinall winning significantly quicker being counteracted by Anderson scoring significantly heavier when losing legs, so this should be close and the market reflects this. It's hard to truly call this given Gary's limited sample throughout the year, but what we do have tends to agree with the line - Nathan's 6/5 and he does project to be a small underdog.
van Gerwen v Bunting - Interesting one here, Michael's yet to really hit his true heights in his first two games, whereas Bunting had one very close game against Perales, and then one not so much against Jonny Clayton. We're obviously not backing van Gerwen at 1/10 given Bunting passes a de minimis test of competence, but Stephen at 7/1? Can we? No is the simple answer. The worst projection I see for van Gerwen is winning around 85% of the time, and it gets up to over 90% if we look at the last three months of play. It's a test of your belief in Bunting's levels - if he does play like he did at times in Minehead and as he did against Clayton, he can certainly get this to 1-1, 2-2 in sets and then who knows. I'm being objective and ignoring it, but if you want to go with Stephen (on the handicaps it might be even better, Bunting +3.5 sets is available at 4/7 which I think I'll have a non-tracked bit of), then go right ahead, don't let me stop you.
Back later this evening for tomorrow's remaining round four matches - I might split the post and get the afternoon session, which we know the line up for, out of the way early, and then the evening session later on.
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