My match-by-match guide for night two of the new Cazoo Premier League Darts season includes statistics, predictions, best bets and an acca.
The new-look Premier League heads to the M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool on Thursday night as Peter Wright bids to make it two knockout 'titles' out of two but with Jonny Clayton in his half of the draw, we will be guaranteed a different final to what we saw in Cardiff.
Darts betting tips: Premier League night two
1pt Clayton and Smith both to hit 3+ 180s each at 7/4 (Paddy Power)
1pt Joe Cullen to win and hit most 180s at 6/4 (Paddy Power)
| Paddy Power |
SL Acca: Wright, Smith (+1.5), Cullen & Price all to win with Paddy Power
Thursday February 10: Night two
TV Coverage: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)
Format: Best of 11 legs
Peter Wright (8/13) v Michael van Gerwen (5/4)
Head to Head: 23-2-64 (TV: 7-2-36)
Meetings since start of 2021: 3-2 (TV: 2-2)
Tournament Average: 102.56 - 96.12
Tournament 180s (180s per leg): 8 (0.30) - 2 (0.20)
Tournament Checkout %: 48.65% (18/39) - 40% (4/10)
Tournament 100+ Checkouts: 1 - 2
% legs won with a 100% checkout: 5.56% - 50%
Peter Wright is very much the man of the moment again after his Masters debacle and having produced a mesmerising display to thrash Jonny Clayton 6-1 with a 113.02 average in last week's final, he then went and maintained his sizzling momentum on the opening weekend of the Pro Tour season. Snakebite overcame the Ferret yet again en route to Saturday's Players Championship semi-finals, where he lost to Ryan Searle despite averaging 100+ for the fifth time in a row, but on Sunday he went even further by beating Gerwyn Price in the final to close to within £5,500 of the world number one on the PDC's Order of Merit. The world champion spoke about adopting a Phil Taylor-esque mindset after his triumph in Cardiff and he's certainly backing that up on a consistent basis - as long as he doesn't bring those Masters darts out to play again.
Even in a tightly-fought game like last Thursday's semi-final against Gary Anderson that went to an 11th leg, he has that aura bordering on invincibility like Michael van Gerwen once had.
Sadly for MVG, his fear factor has long gone and can't seem to buy a win right now. He lost 6-4 to Anderson in Cardiff despite averaging five points higher with 96 and on Saturday he was soundly beaten 6-3 by Daryl Gurney in a match where they both managed 98.
It got a whole lot worse on Sunday when he lost to Stephen Burton, who averaged just 89, in round three and unless he finds some form of old soon, it could be a very tough couple of months.
The stats, however, suggest he's not been doing too much wrong in recent months. The PDC released a graphic earlier this week which revealed his average over the last 100 legs played was 99.64 - third only to Jonny Clayton (100.34) and Peter Wright (99.65) - but his immediate form is a real worry.
Snakebite has won their last three meetings too, including last year's World Matchplay semi-finals (17-10) and the Players Championship Finals (10-6), so I'd expect him to make that four.
Scoreline prediction: 6-3
Jonny Clayton (8/13) v Michael Smith (5/4)
Head to Head: 3-8 (TV: 1-4)
Meetings since start of 2021: 1-1 (TV: 0-1)
Tournament Average: 96.75 - 88.57
Tournament 180s (180s per leg): 10 (0.40) - 0 (0.00)
Tournament Checkout %: 36.11% (13/36) - 100% (3/3)
Tournament 100+ Checkouts: 0 - 1
% legs won with a 100% checkout: 5.56% - 33.33%
If this is half as entertaining as their World Championship classic then we'll be in for a treat - even if it is a fraction of the length.
Michael Smith, who earned the PDC's Televised Performance of the Year accolade by virtue of that thrilling 4-3 victory, is the outsider to extend the dominant head-to-head record he olds over Jonny Clayton but he'll need to make a dramatic improvement on what we've already seen from him this season.
Bully Boy remarkably failed to hit a single 180 during his 6-3 defeat to Peter Wright and averaged less than 90 while his fortunes didn't improve much in Barnsley at the weekend, losing two of his four matches and averaging just 96.23 overall.
At least the St Helens ace won't be far from home in Liverpool and will enjoy the crowd support, with Clayton being on the opposite end of the treatment that helped inspire him to a couple of victories in Cardiff prior to his final defeat to Wright.
The Welshman wasn't actually that hot over the weekend, averaging 97.89 overall and also suffering a first-round defeat to Madars Razma on the Sunday, so there's reason to be cautious about backing the form horse.
Smith's performance last week was a blip - especially in regards to the 180s - and we should expect plenty of maximums from both players in a close contest that the underdog could nick.
Scoreline prediction: 5-6
James Wade (11/10) v Joe Cullen (8/11)
Head to Head: 6-4 (TV: 1-0)
Meetings since start of 2021: 0-1 (TV: 0-1)
Tournament Average: 90.13 - 95.36
Tournament 180s (180s per leg): 3 (0.30) - 5 (0.63)
Tournament Checkout %: 33.33% (10/30) - 10.53% (2/19)
Tournament 100+ Checkouts: 3 - 1
% legs won with a 100% checkout: 30% - 50%
It's fair to say Joe Cullen's Premier League debut was something of a baptism fire as a raucous atmosphere in Cardiff roared Jonny Clayton on to a convincing 6-2 victory and no doubt played a part in the Rockstar's woeful finishing.
Fresh from his maiden major title at the Masters, Cullen certainly scored well enough and hit five 180s but he missed a whopping 17 of his 19 darts at doubles to make life even easier for the Ferret.
We can, however, safely put lines through freakishly bad stats like that rather than use them as a reliable form guide because he's not going to be that wasteful again any time soon, while the crowd won't be so off putting for him on Thursday night.
At the weekend he averaged over 100 on four occasions across his seven matches while his overall mark of 99.22 was the third highest behind Damon Heta and Boris Krcmar.
James Wade, by contrast, only managed 92.80 across his four matches at the weekend while his upset victory over Gerwyn Price in Cardiff last Thursday was in no small part down to the Iceman being well below his best.
The Machine's average of 88.78 was marginally lower than Price's 89 but his three 100+ checkouts proved to be the difference. Against Clayton he upped his average to 91.45 only to miss nine of his 13 darts at doubles.
I really fancy to Cullen to pick up his first win of the campaign and if you throw in the 180s, which should be the easy bit, you can get odds-against prices.
Scoreline prediction: 3-6
Gerwyn Price (4/9) v Gary Anderson (13/8)
Head to Head: 9-9 (TV: 6-4)
Meetings since start of 2021: 2-1 (TV: 1-0)
Tournament Average: 89.12 - 95.83
Tournament 180s (180s per leg): 1 (0.11) - 4 (0.19)
Tournament Checkout %: 21.43% (3/14) - 47.83% (11/23)
Tournament 100+ Checkouts: 0 - 1
Gerwyn Price made a mess of his big night as a crowd favourite in Cardiff so he might ironically fare much better in his usual role as the pantomime villain. Obviously it doesn't matter who he plays for that to happen - as long as he's outside of Wales - but the one-sided nature of the crowd will always be greater still when Gary Anderson is his opponent.
The pair have long buried the hatchet over 'that' Grand Slam of Darts final but nevertheless there's still that extra bit of spice and hype to this fixture that gives the fans more reason to get involved. Price has won four of their last five meetings, including the 2021 World Championship final, but they've not faced each other since June so we can't read too much into their head-to-heads.
The Iceman did bounce back from last Thursday night by reaching Sunday's Players Championship final against Wright and although he tasted defeat, he'll be encouraged by the fact he averaged 100+ five times across his nine matches all weekend. Anderson looked pretty sharp too, picking up five wins and averaging 98.87, which wasn't much lower than Wright's 98.91 and Price's 99.41.
The Flying Scotsman scrapped a win over Michael van Gerwen with a low 90s average last week to pick up a couple of points and while he was pipped by Snakebite in the semi-finals, he does have reasons to be confident.
That said I'll give the edge to Price because of the form he showed at the weekend.
Scoreline prediction: 6-4
Who will win night two? Gerwyn Price is favourite to land the 'title' just like he was in Cardiff and he'll no doubt fancy his chances of reaching the final given he's in the slightly softer half of this week's draw. If my predictions pan out then he'll probably be meeting either Peter Wright or Michael Smith for the £10,000 bonus and while that obviously has no baring on the world rankings, it would be the perfect opportunity to remind everyone of who the official number one is. For the time being at least. Weekly winner: Night two odds
Price: 11/4
Wright: 7/2
Clayton: 5/1
MVG: 11/2
Smith: 7/1
Cullen: 8/1
Wade: 9/1
Anderson: 11/1
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