2019 European Championship Darts Tips by James Punt

by Dave Stevos | Oct 22, 2019 | Uncategorized | 0 comments

James Punt hit the wire with his outright selection for the Champions League of Darts. Peter Wright suffered an agonising defeat in the final, losing 11-10. He had the match at his mercy but nerves got the better of him and MVG pounced. There is another quality tournament starting on Thursday evening. Check out James Punt’s 2019 European Championship Darts tips and in depth preview below. Download the TXAPP to see free daily match previews.

2019 European Championship Darts Preview

It was a frustrating result in last weekend’s Champions League of Darts final when our 11.00 selection, Peter Wright, blew a 10-7 lead in the final, missed match darts and lost 11-10 to Van Gerwen. Can we go one better this weekend?

This week’s tournament features the top 32 players on this years European Tour order of merit playing a straight knockout format with the number 1 seed, Michael Van Gerwen playing the 32nd seed and so on. The first-round matches are best of eleven legs, the second round and quarter finals are best of nineteen legs. The semi-finals and final are best of twenty-one legs.

This is the 12th European Championship and takes place in Gottingen, Germany, despite the absence of a single German qualifier. There have been five previous winners of the title, Phil Taylor (x4), Simon Whitlock, Adrian Lewis, Michael van Gerwen (x4) and James Wade last year.

MVG A More Than Fair Price

Michael van Gerwen is the 2.50 favourite which seems a touch generous given his tournament record and recent form. He has won back to back televised tournaments, the World Grand Prix and last weekend’s Champions League. He has won his last ten matches in a row and seems pretty unstoppable.

However, the fact is that it was very hard work for him last week. MVG was taken to the wire by Gerwyn Price in the semi-final and Peter Wright missed an open goal in the final. Van Gerwen can no longer just expect to turn up at these big events and expect the opposition just to roll over. There are too many good players out there, too many that can give him a game. There is no doubt that he will take some stopping, but it will be no walk in the park. It is likely that he will have to face Glen Durrant in the second round and he has yet to beat the three-time BDO World Champion. That said, his quarter of the draw, Durrant excepted, looks very winnable for MVG.

Chizzy Struggles On TV

The second quarter features only one player who could be described as being in very good form, Dave Chisnall. The problem with Chizzy is that he doesn’t win televised events. James Wade is also in this quarter, but the defending champion has been in mixed form of late and isn’t playing as well as he was this time last year. Jonny Clayton is in decent form and could be a bit of a dark horse, but the rest of the group are all losing more matches than they are winning at the moment.

The third quarter sees number two seed Ian White in a fairly tricky group of players. Michael Smith is his first hurdle and the quarter also features Peter Wright who has won nine of his last ten matches and dangerous loose cannons such as Hughes, De Zwann, Wattimena, Brown and Bunting. It could be between White and Wright as to who wins that quarter.