World Darts Championship Preview - Hard to look past Price

Christmas just isn’t Christmas without the darts and this year should be another cracker as Gerwyn Price defends his title at Alexandra Palace over 16 days of top tungsten action.

96 players from all over the world head to the home of darts chasing the £500,000 first prize and Sid Waddell Trophy.

The top 32 seeds enter in the second round where they play the winner of a first-round match between the next 32 in rankings and 32 qualifiers.

Gone are the days of Phil Taylor’s dominance, and Michael van Gerwen hasn’t quite become the all-conquering power we thought he might, but having a more open tournament just adds to the intrigue and drama of one of the highlights of the festive sporting calendar.

Is the Price right to back Gerwyn again?

Defending champion Gerwyn Price leads the betting as the 5.0 favourite to retain the crown he won with a dominant final victory over Gary Anderson.

The former rugby player had to twice win a sudden death final leg to sneak through the rounds last year, but that’s exactly the kind of nerve you need to win a world title. He’s so hard to beat over the longer sets format, and also won the Grand Slam in November to show he’s in form.

Perhaps the only real negative may be the returning Ally Pally crowd, as Price has often found himself cast in the pantomime villain role, and even for someone with his mentality that’s tough to continually deal with.

Michael van Gerwen is vying for a fourth world title at Alexandra Palace.

Big four lead the betting

After Price, three-time champion Michael van Gerwen is second favourite at 5.8 but has not won a major title this year. He has made it to four semi-finals and a final, and leads the averages for the season so he’s been a consistent power scorer.

MVG will get better as the tournament goes on due to that scoring and the old Van Gerwen could well emerge – but the worry is he’s lost that fear factor he once had over opponents.

2020 champion Peter Wright can never be counted out as a 9.2 chance after winning the World Matchplay and the recent Players Championship, but he’s getting no younger and in a really tough quarter of the draw.

Rounding out the top four is Jonny Clayton who’s trading at 8, but has won four big TV tournaments this year as the most successful player on tour. He won the Premier League on his debut but sadly for him he’s only the eighth seed so is in the same quarter as fellow Welshman and defending champion Price.

Although ‘The Ferret’ isn’t in the world’s top four, he’s in the top four of the betting and after hammering Price 5-1 in the Grand Prix final, if they both make it through the early rounds, a blockbuster contest awaits us in the last eight.

Each-way names to note

There are some big names at some big prices that will draw some in, such as last year’s runner-up and two-time champion Gary Anderson, who can be backed at 25 and obviously loves this event but just hasn’t shown any form this year that would make him a contender.

James Wade is a huge price at 30 for a world number four who’s won everything in the game bar this. Although he’s not been beyond the quarters since 2013 he’s the top seed in a wide-open section this time.

Also in Wade’s quarter is Joe Cullen, who is a massive price at 50 but has the game and scoring stats this season to make a deep run here.

Nathan Aspinall can be backed at 23 on the exchange and that’s a decent price considering he’s made the semis twice in three years – and that one failure being without the crowds last year.

Rob Cross won this event on his debut in 2018 and, although he’s had a poor couple of years, he’s just shown signs of recovery of late, beating Van Gerwen to win the European Championship and reaching the Grand Slam quarters - 25 could be a big price if ‘Voltage’ can find his form again.