Grand Slam

You may have noted that I didn't put anything up in terms of the group stages. That's for a few reasons - one, I didn't have the time. Two, the ultra short races mean there is a fair bit more variance than more or less any televised event, so I think I'd need a bit more edge than normal to cover still hopefully being neutral EV if our pick didn't win the darts. Third, there's too many matches that are not worth looking at, either because they are dead rubbers or feature players we don't have reliable data on, then finally there's also a fair number of games where it's just something like Cross against Wright and we're seeing two very well known players, limiting the upside. So sorry about that, looking through the results I'm thinking it may be for the best, we might have picked up some money on Mansell and Wattimena but then given it back in more places. But we can at least look at the last sixteen. Noppert against Mansell isn't of interest. While Mansell has been solid and this has been a very good tournament for him, Danny is extremely strong and I've got him taking enough that Mickey can't even be rated to win one in four. At 3/1 and with the vig it's a clear no bet. Wade against Menzies I've got as too close to call. That might offer a tiny shred of value on the Ladbrokes price of 6/5 on Menzies, but I can't recommend it - James has an extreme amount of experience and a good track record in these sorts of extended leg play formats, so I think it's fair to give him a bit extra, and even 1% or 2% more drags us out of real betting opportunities. Where we are going though is 365, and 0.25u Smith 4/6 against Lukeman. Martin's looked very good, true, and Ross has not looked his best, but we trust in the deeper numbers which are calling this 70/30 in Ross's favour and not the 60/40 which the line indicates, that's more than enough to fire. Another 70/30 which I'm seeing which the market isn't seeing that way is Cross against Edhouse, yes there is reason to think that Ritchie is playing a fair bit better than historical numbers suggest, if down to confidence and nothing else, but this is a big enough number to go with, 0.25u Cross 8/11 in multiple places.