BDO - Day 4 - Tuesday Afternoon
Dave Parletti gets his challenge underway on Tuesday as he faces qualifier Krzysztof Kciuk in the first round. It's a match he should win with plenty to spare frankly.
Kciuk was far from commanding in his preliminary win - six of his 11 legs required a seventh visit to the oche, and not once did he complete a let in leg than 15 darts. That makes him really vulnerable here, and Dave Parletti is completely justified as a 2/5 shot. I would be close to 1/5 personally.
We're not in the business of advising such short selections however, so we'll head to the handicap markets instead, where Bet365 offer 5/6 on Parletti winning giving up the start.
1.2pts Parletti (-1.5 sets) to beat Kciuk at 5/6 (Bet365)
We don't know the outcome of Oliver Ferenc v Ryan Hoggarth at time of writing, but we'd expect Scott Mitchell to be around the 1/4 mark to beat either (slightly more likely to beat Ferenc and less likely to beat Hoggarth). We'll come back on this game if anything opens up.
Ross Montgomery v Scott Baker looks in the balance, and that's exactly how the bookies have priced it up, so we won't get involved in that one.
In the Ladies, Aileen de Graaf looks a solid pick against Paula Jacklin, who just cannot seem to perform against the cream of the ladies game. In evaluating this one I noticed a really strong trend.
Expanded to all her matches against players inside the Top 8 of the world, she has a shocking head-to-head record. Shes lost 0-8 v Lisa Ashton, 2-13 v Deta Hedman, 0-11 v Fallon Sherrock, 0-7 for Aileen de Graaf, 0-9 v Anastasia Dobromyslova, 1-3 v Lorraine Winstanley, 1-3 v Sharon Prins and 0-7 v Trina Gulliver.
Combined thats a 4-61 record, and just 2-48 against Top 5 players. Over the past two seasons she is just 3-22 and just 2-19 v Top 5 players.
She just cannot produce against the bigger names and the same is so big we can't ignore it. As one of the weaker players in the event, we should be backing de Graaf to win 2-0 in this one. She is 4/5 with BetVictor, BetFred and BetBright.
2.5pts de Graaf to win 2-0 v Jacklin at 4/5 (Betfred, BetVictor, BetBright)