STAR DARTS PREVIEW: Premier League Week 9

Welcome to Week 9 of the 2024 Premier League. This week, the 4-month road-show heads into the second half of the campaign in Belfast, writes LEWIS WILLIAMS.

The first match of the night is set to serve up some fireworks and the difficult side of the draw is certainly the top half, which is why Gerwyn Price occupies a spot as the 3rd favourite to win the night. This piece has been successful in the last 6 first round matches so a repeat performance would see another profitable week.

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WEEK NINE WINNER

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? Luke Humphries
? Luke Littler
? Gerwyn Price
? Michael van Gerwen
? Rob Cross
? Michael Smith
? Nathan Aspinall
? Peter Wright

? Luke Humphries
? Luke Littler

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Last week, Humphries was unplayable with 3 averages above 104 as he soared to a third consecutive weekly win, matching the record of van Gerwen previously this year. There’s no getting away from how good he’s been lately, however, the performances of Luke Littler don’t necessarily justify him being as big as ? when he’s won both meetings between the pair in the Premier League this year.

It seems as though the layers have seen the two big red L’s next to Littler’s name and dismissed him quickly, but in reality he averaged 97.10 in defeat to a flying Aspinall and 97.52 against Smith most recently.

Let’s not forget that before that, he put up one of the best performances ever seen in the Premier League against Michael van Gerwen averaging 114 with 8 maximums and won a European Tour with a tournament average of 103 just four days prior. On paper, there could be fireworks here but Luke Littler went off at 10/11 and 3/4 respectively for the last two fixtures, so an underdog price of ? is outrageously appealing.

? Michael Smith
? Michael van Gerwen

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I’ve been buying the dip on Michael Smith at an underdog price for the last few weeks and I’m going to do that once again at a price of ? to beat Michael van Gerwen.

Bully Boy has been slowly on the up lately with creditable performances that are a million times more positive than his horrendous end to last year and start to this year. Reaching the final last week and averaging 99.68 and 101.18 in his first two matches illustrate that ? against a patchy Michael van Gerwen who can’t seem to get rolling in the Premier League since his three consecutive weekly wins is too big.

In fact, the Green Machine is now on a four match losing streak in the opening round of the Premier League and has put in some real howlers for his standard, seen in 93.48 against Humphries in Week 5 and 94.83 against Cross in Week 6. Smith has looked a lot more comfortable on the travelling stage lately and I’m happy to take him at an odds against price that he averages 98+ which will surely be good enough to go close in the second match of the evening in Belfast.

? Nathan Aspinall
? Gerwyn Price

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This fascinating match between 4th and 7th place sees Gerwyn Price as a ? favourite but I make him slightly shorter and I’m happy to take a generous price of ? about a -1.5 match handicap.

Price has had some real hard luck stories lately like in Dublin most recently when he comfortably beat van Gerwen with an average of 102.96 and then failed to get past Michael Smith with an average of just over a ton. The week before that he averaged 103.33 in defeat 6-5 to Peter Wright who averaged a lot less but whose doubles were relentless.

After what has been generally a poor first few months of the calendar year for the Welshman, I do see a way out of the tunnel for him and tonight is the night to send a message that he’s not dead just yet. On the arguably easier half of the draw where he plays Cross/Wright in the next round, there’s every chance he could make a final for the first time since Week 1 in Cardiff.

Asp just hasn’t done it for me in recent weeks. I tipped him to beat Cross when he obliged with an average of 101.4 but he was then a bit of a disappointment when averaging 8 less in the next round against Cool Hand. He’s far too inconsistent to bank on against a Gerwyn Price whose stock I see massively rising in the upcoming weeks.

LEWIS WILLIAMS

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