Chris Landman (#70 FRH, 87.51 (#72), 346-355 (49.36%, #69))
Lee Lok Yin (#169 FRH, 84.84 (#85), 24-24 (50.00%, #63))
Feels like it's been a very tough season for Brendan, despite his run to the quarter finals here last year, and despite him actually winning a Pro Tour. Let's talk about that latter one - that seemed to be pretty darned fortunate, in that he didn't really play anyone of true quality, the only worlds seeded players he came up against were Peter Wright and Daryl Gurney, and neither player he faced in the last two rounds was able to average 90 against him. I don't think calling it a fortunate run is unfair, and outside of that it's been fairly dry, three quarter finals isn't awful but fourteen first round exits is kind of bad, and since that last quarter final he's on a 6-14 record where the only players who are in this field that he beat were Mickey Mansell, Stephen Burton and Rhys Griffin, and he's averaging below 90 more often than he is averaging above it. The European Tour wasn't much better, benefitting hugely from the new qualification criteria but now on a run of five straight first round defeats, not getting easy draws but not getting any real stinkers either. He's without a ranking TV win since this last time last year, losing in the UK Open to Dimitri, Joe Cullen at the Matchplay, and Martin Schindler at the Grand Prix and PC Finals - not qualifying for the European Championship or Grand Slam. He did have a bit of a cameo at the World Cup with Josh Rock, but how much we can read into that seems kind of limited. Now 51, I find it hard to imagine that with the decline in numbers and the relatively poor season, whether he considers going the Beaton route and hitting the seniors tour - a slip out of the top 32 seems possible, and while I think he'll have enough in the bank to save his card after 2025, it might be the case that he's just making up the numbers in 2025-6 should he decide to stick it out.
Chris has had a so-so beginning to his first tour card, doing pretty much the minimum that you need to do in order to have a realistic chance of holding onto your card in that he made this event and also made the Players Championship Finals, this following his Lakeside final defeat to Andy Baetens - who didn't make it here. On the floor, Chris peaked with a late semi final, but one where he defeated Ross Smith but nobody else inside the world's top 3, so, much like Dolan's win, very much a case of just beating who's in front of you. A couple of other spells weren't bad either, he had an early run of three board finals in a row, and then back to back board wins in August, but too often it was out first round (13 times) or one and done (eight times). This was enough to get him to Minehead as mentioned, but only in the last quarter of qualifiers and he won just the two legs against Raymond van Barneveld. There's not a huge amount outside of the Pro Tour to add - he did get one major win at the UK Open in the first round over Christopher Toonders but would then be whitewashed by Lee Evans, and the European Tour was almost a total loss, making the first one in Belgium only to lose to Mike de Decker and not qualify for another one since. He's given himself a chance of holding his card, but it feels a bit like the prize money earned is in excess of what he should have, and it seems less than 50/50 that the same level of play would get the same amount of results in 2025. Only needs one good run though, and he has got them the last two years.
Lee is going to make his debut here, and it is as a result of his run at the Asian Championship. There, Lee would reach the semi finals - going 1-1 in his group but advancing on leg difference, then winning a deciding leg against Nitin Kumar and upsetting Alexis Toylo in the quarter finals. Sandro Sosing would then knock him out, but with Lourence Ilagan holding a qualifying spot already, the place dropped down to Lee. This was a real surprise - his results on the Asian Tour have been incredibly underwhelming, with an overall average below 80, and a best run of a quarter final, reaching that stage on three occasions. Maybe he did something in the event that didn't properly make it to Dart Connect, who knows (edit - no, not really). He does have some TV experience with a few World Cup appearances, most recently this year with Man Lok Leung where they defeated Japan but lost to Australia, and that was his third appearance with Hong Kong at that event, so a big stage won't be completely alien to him.
This seems like one of the weakest sections by far. I think it's probably a case that Landman is too good for Lee, how big a favourite is hard to say given relative lack of data on Lee, but I think an absolute maximum of Lee's chances is one in three, and realistically it could be way below that. Then Dolan might be the weakest seed of any, and Landman's probably approaching a 40/60 dog in that, but it doesn't seem like a game that would be pretty to watch, I'm not sure how quickly Landman plays, but it'd need to approach Ricky Evans levels to offset Brendan and the relative low levels in terms of possible worst second round game to view as a casual.
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