Players Championship Event Betting
- By Jaymes Monte on February 1, 2011 18:05 GMT
The 2011 darts season is now underway and this weekend’s Players Championship Finals event marks the first of the PDC’s Premier events.
Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor inevitably goes off as the tournament favourite but he appears to be a long way off the form that he showed in the middle part of 2010.
Taylor relinquished his World Championship crown last month when Mark Webster defeated him in the quarter-finals of the event and The Power has since lost in the fourth round and quarter-finals of recent Players Championship tournaments.
Following defeat to Andy Smith last Saturday the 15-time World Champion was in downbeat mood about his current form.
"Andy played really well," said Taylor. "It's frustrating when you get beaten but sometimes it gives you a kick up the backside. I'm still a little bit off my form but other players, like Andy, are playing really well too.
"I've got some new darts which I need to practice more with because I haven't had a lot of time with them yet. I've got some hard work to do and I'll put it right."
Mervyn King went on to beat Vincent van der Voort in the final of that event to end an 11-month gap between titles. The King is a 25/1 chance to go one better than his runner-up finish in the 2010 Players Championship Finals and van der Voort, who had a good run at the World Championships, is a 40/1 chance.
World champion Adrian Lewis wasn’t involved in either of last weekend’s events so makes his first appearance here since claiming the sport’s biggest prize. He is 10/1 to win the Players Championship title, although will certainly be forgiven if he isn’t at the top of his game this weekend.
Gary Anderson, arguably the best player of the tournament at Alexandra Palace, has threatened to become the new superpower in the game for a few years now. His run to the final of the World Championships should finally have shaken the monkey off his back and is a 5/1 chance for victory here.
There is a sense of a changing of the guard in darts at present but we’ve been here before in the past. On the wrong side of 50 is age finally catching up with the greatest player ever to throw a dart?
