World Grand Slam of Darts 2018

World Grand Slam of Darts 2018

The World Grand Slam of Darts kicks off on Saturday at the Aldersely Leisure Village, Wolverhampton. This tournament has a unique format with the best of the PDC and BDO locking horns for a share of the £450,000 prize fund. The 32 player field compete in eight groups before the top two from each group progress to the knockout stage.

Red hot favourite Michael Van Gerwen (10/11) is looking for his fourth consecutive win in the competition after seeing off Peter Wright in last year’s final and the Dutchman has been in outstanding form all year winning 12 tournaments (13 if you include the World Cup of Darts) so no doubt he will have his army of backers at that price. However, the green machine didn’t look at his best at last week’s World Series of Darts Finals where he was beaten by Raymond Van Barneveld in the quarter finals and we see some value in taking him on at the prices. If you’re looking for a player in form at the moment then do not look any further than James Wade, who since becoming a Dad 3 weeks ago has not lost a match. He followed up his win over, fellow in form player, Simon Whitlock in the European Championships with a win in Austria last week defeating Michael Smith 11-10 in a thrilling final. We see the 28/1 (Betfred) as an outstanding each way bet. As mentioned, Simon Whitlock has quietly been coming back to his best recently and whilst his record in the Grand Slam of Darts is not that inspiring we feel he could well outrun his odds (50/1).

Of course we also have the players from the BDO coming over testing their skills against the PDC lads and with no Martin ‘Wolfie’ Adams this year it will be up to the current BDO World Champion Glen Durrant (50/1) to lead the way. Glen will surely have a point to prove after turning down the PDC’s invite to join them at the end of last year. However, we quite like one of the BDO’s outsiders in Adam Smith-Neale (500/1) who won his first major tournament last month defeating Glen Durrant 6-4 in the Winmau World Masters final at Spa Bridlington and whilst were not saying he will win the tournament he could well make a name for himself here.

Tips:

James Wade 28/1 e/w (Betfred)

Simon Whitlock 50/1 e/w (Betfred)

Adam Smith-Neale 500/1 (Betfred)