First Round
Arron Monk v Jose Justicia, 7.15pm
Justicia, from Spain, is another player making their bow on the biggest stage for their first time. He’s nicknamed ‘The Joker’ and had shown has a decent player before, but we’ll have to see how he does at Ally Pally.
Arron Monk’s an experienced player, with four appearances in the World Championships. He has never made it past the first round though, having lost to the likes of Peter Wright and Kevin Painter in years gone by.
Monk should be alright here for me. It’ll be a tight match, but I’m going for Monk to win 3-2 at 10/3.
Andy Boulton v Danny Baggish, 8.10pm
Andy Boutlon from Scotland, but lives in Stoke and is a big Potters fan – poor fella. This is his second time at the World Championship and he lost to Gary Anderson a year ago.
Danny Baggish is a 36-year-old American from Lakeland, Florida who won the North American Dart Championship. But, Boulton is playing well right now and I’d expect the American’s lack of experience on the big stage to make a difference. Take Boulton to win at 8/13.
James Richardson v Mikuru Suzuki, 9.05pm
Suzuki is the first lady of Japanese darts and the reigning women’s World Champion. She’d nicknamed “Miracle” and put up a strong performance against Gerwyn Price at the Grand Slam this year.
You might remember James Richardson from a few years ago, he comes out to “Vindaloo” and beat Barney here a few years ago – which earned him free curry for life from his local curry shop.
Mikuru Suzuki is huge price at 4/1 in this match though, and all the pressure will be on Richardson. I’m going for a bit of girl power at the Palace with Suzuki to progress.
Second Round
Michael Smith v Luke Woodhouse, 10pm
Luke Woodhouse was the villain in his first-round match, taking out crowd favourite Paul Lim and he faces last year’s finalist Michael Smith in the only Second Round match on Sunday.
Woodhouse can cause Michael Smith some problems, but I think the higher-ranked man will just get through after a scare at 1/6.
All our Darts punts can be found at PaddyPower.com* All odds correct at time of posting.
