2021 UK Open Darts Outright Tips by James Punt
2021 UK Open Darts Outright Preview
The 2021 UK Open will be a little different. Obviously, it will be played behind closed doors, at the MK Arena, Milton Keynes and there will be no amateur players. Normally we have 32 players who qualify via various regional events. However, these were not able to be played.
Instead those places have been given to the top 8 players on the 2020 Development Tour OOM, the top 8 from the 2020 Challenge Tour OOM, the top 8 non qualifiers from the 2021 UK Q school and the top 8 non qualifiers from the 2021 European Q school. They are joined by the 128 Tour card holders.
No Seeds
There are no seeds in the tournament and the ties are made by a random draw for each round. Rounds 1-3 are a best of 11 leg format. Round 1 sees the 32 players from the Q schools and Development and Challenge tours along with players ranked 97 -128 on the PDC OOM. The winners are then drawn against players ranked 65-96 for the second round. Winners then are drawn against players ranked 33 – 64for the third round.
The top 32 players on the OOM enter at the fourth round stage. All matches in round four to the quarter final stage are best of 19 legs, with the semi-final and final best of 21 legs.
There have been six tour card holders who have withdrawn for personal reasons. There will be no replacements so six players will get a bye into round two.
Could Be A Surprise On The Cards
The random draw should increase the chances of an outsider winning the tournament, but the reality is that we haven’t seen any real surprises in the Tournament’s 18-year history. Nathan Aspinall was a 126.00 shot when he won in 2019 but he was tipped up here. So it was not a surprise for James Punt’s punters. Robert Thornton beating Phil Taylor was arguably the biggest surprise. Phil Taylor won five titles, Barney two, Wade two, with one each for Aspinall, Wright, Lewis, Thornton, Anderson, and Roland Scholten back in 2004.
However, it does mean that Gerwyn Price could face MVG as soon as round four. So, it is a tournament were outsiders can be considered with a little more confidence as a player can get lucky with the draws. Of course, they are just as likely to be unlucky. The best thing to do, as always, is to concentrate on finding players who are in top form.
This year we are helped by having just had the first of the season’s Super Series played last week. The four Players Championship events should prove to be an excellent form guide for this even.
We had four different winners at the Super Series but only one star. The winners were Joe Cullen, Callum Rydz and Raymond van Barneveld. The Star? The Ferret, Jonny Clayton.
Ferret In Flying Form
Jonny Clayton is the most in-form player in darts right now. The 2020 World Cup winner started 2021 by winning The Masters at this very venue last month. He followed that up by winning PC4 on Sunday. He was also runner up in PC1 and PC2. Altogether in 2021 he has played 31 matches and won 28. From five tournaments he reached four finals, winning two. He only lost the other two in a deciding leg.
At the Super Series he averaged 98.73 across 26 matches, won 65% of his 249 legs played. That is an extraordinarily consistent level of top form over four, very intense days. After two days I expected him to drop off, mental tiredness was bound to kick in. He ‘only’ reached the quarter final in day three, but he averaged 103 in defeat to Danny Noppert before returning on Sunday to win PC4.
Obviously, Clayton is the favourite right? Wrong. Clayton is the fourth favourite at 13.00. The favourites are MVG at 6.00, Gerwyn Price 7.00 and Peter Wright at 11.00. All three have questions marks about them.
MVG Dethroned
Michael van Gerwen was dethroned as the world number 1 after Gerwyn Price replaced him as both world champion and world number 1. Mighty Mike had a poor 2020 season but still won two majors, including this one. He remains a top player by anyone’s standard, but his confidence has taken a battering. He is cracking when being put under pressure and many of his opponents are raising their game when playing him. The more players that beat him, the less others fear him.
At the Super Series MVG played 14 matches and won 10, averaging a fifth best 98.31. That is a very good standard, but he failed to win a title. MVG is all about winning titles, not matches. He reached the semi-final of PC4 but lost 3-7 to Damon Heta. In the quarter final he was 2-2 with Madars Razma but he claimed that Razma was making a noise to put him off.
The result was to knock Razma out of his stride and the Latvian failed to win another leg. It looked like old school bullying against a ‘lesser’ player and it’s not the first time he has had a go at player recently. Clearly it is a sign of frustration and frustrated players who are lacking in confidence rarely play their best. Van Gerwen may well go on and win this title. However, at 5.50 he is very poor value.
Health Concerns For The Iceman
Gerwyn Price may be the World number 1, but Jonny Clayton is making a case for being the best player in Wales. Price only played the first two days of the Super Series. He lost in the second round on both days and averaged just 90.7. He then withdrew and is said to be suffering from an ear infection.
Clearly it was the infection which was the cause of his sudden loss in form, but it remains to be seen if he is fully recovered. If so, his odds can be justified but there must be some doubt as to his health.
Snakebite Struggles Continue
As for Peter Wright, where has his form gone? Wright was the World Champion this time last year and he picked up seven titles in total in 2020. His last win was Players Championship 22 on November 13th. He has now played nine tournaments without a win. He was a semi-finalist in the Players Championship finals and this year’s Masters, but he turned up for last week’s Summer Series with yet another set of darts.
Very different from any he used last year. That they didn’t go in the bin very quickly was a surprise, but he stuck with them with little success. His 3-dart average was 94.14 and he won seven of his eleven matches. Not bad but the bookies reckon he has a better chance than Jonny Clayton. Once again, they give a player’s ranking far too much weighting.
All three players at the top of the betting are poor value, and we should be looking for in-form alternatives.
Cullen On The Rise
Joe Cullen is another player who has upped his game in the last 6 months or so. He won the International Darts Open on the Euro Tour at the end of October and also the final Players Championship qualifier of 2020. He only reached the fourth round at the World Championship. However, that will have felt like winning it for Cullen, such was his dire record at Ally Pally.
Cullen got a pasting by Gerwyn Price in the second round of the Masters but bounced back by winning PC1 last week. Overall, at the Super Series he played 20 and won 17, averaging 97.16. He was the second winning most player after Jonny Clayton.
One of 2020’s breakthrough players, Dirk van Duijvenbode, had a good Super Series, winning 12 of his 16 matches, averaging 98.68 and hitting no less than 50 maximum’s at 0.387 per leg. He is still improving and is very much at home on the big stages and he has the game to beat the best.
The Aubergenius played well in majors last year, reaching the quarter finals of the European Championship, the Players Championship and the final of the World Grand Prix, before reaching the quarter final at the World Championship. He may only be ranked 30 in the OOM but he is a much better player than that.
Heta Has Potential
Another player I like and is going to win plenty of titles is Damon Heta. Like Duijvenbode, he is a prodigious 180 hitter and very hard to beat when he is seeing the treble 20 bed well. He averaged 97.5 at the Super Series, won eleven of his fifteen matches and was runner up to Jonny Clayton in PC14. He reached the quarter finals of the European and Players Championship finals in his debut season last year and has two PDC titles to his credit.
Danny Noppert didn’t make many headlines at the Super Series but he won 11 from 15, averaged 96.4 and he is getting back into some sort of form. However, his form in PDC majors is nothing to write home about and he may have reached his level now.
Two-time major winner, Daryl Gurney, didn’t have a great 2020 but reached the semi-final of this last year and ended the year with a World Championship quarter final. He won 10 of his 15 matches at the Super Series, averaging 96.19 and while he isn’t in his 2017 form, he is getting closer to it. Maybe we are seeing his A- game, but I expect a good season ahead and a good run in this is entirely possible. His odds are also becoming attractive.
Barney Is Back
Raymond van Barneveld won his tour card back with ease at the recent European Tour school and backed that up by winning PC3 at the Super Series. He is a two-time UK Open championship winner, albeit back in 2006 and 2007. He looked in good shape in the Super Series and much improved on the player that retired a couple of years ago.
Van Barneveld has the hunger back and talent wise is one of the greats. Barney must be a genuine contender but as he is starting from scratch, he enters the tournament in round two. This means he would need eight wins in three days. That is a big physical and mental test for a veteran player.
Barney is also set to play Scotland’s Alan Soutar in his first match. Soutar won a tour card at the recent UK Q school and he made a big impression at the Super Series. He won 9 of his 13 matches but it was who he beat and the nature of his wins that caught the eye. His opponents 3 dart average over those matches was 96.6 so he was not getting many easy matches.
He had wins over Dave Chisnall, Adrian Lewis, Nathan Aspinall and Peter Wright. That win over Wright saw Snakebite average 105 and Souter also took Rydz and Clayton to deciding legs in two of his four defeats. Van Barneveld will have his work cut out against Souter, but he did beat the Scot 6-2 in the quarter final of PC3.
