2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening Preview – JP
2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening Preview
More doubling debacles cost James Punt on Tuesday night. Hopefully today’s selections can do a bit better on the outer ring. Check out his 2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening preview and tips below.
Reflections
It has been a bumpy ride so far. Ten bets, seven losers and -2.55 points down. Not a disaster, just a bit frustrating. Joe Comito would have won if he could have hit just a few more doubles on day one and last night looked set for a 3-1 win for Miekle, but he was poor when it mattered.
As for Plaisier, I’m still not sure how he managed to lose to Wright, but missing 20 doubles was a very big part of it. Just the one session today and three bets to hopefully get some more black in the account.
Jim Williams vs. Paolo Nebrida
Jim Williams struggles to compete at the top level as he is not a full time pro. He is a very capable player but doesn’t put the time in that the full time boys do. He has lost six of his last ten matches but he has been playing some good stuff and his 3 month average is a very handy 95.
Williams has played here for the last three years and has always won his first round match. He hasn’t really faced much in the way of opposition, having beaten Ted Evetts, Sebastian Bialecki and Norman Madhoo. The Welshman has won five of his eight matches at Ally Pally, so he is perfectly comfortable on the big stage. He has got another kindly draw and is the 1.25 favourite.
Asian Qualifier
Paolo Nebrida is an Asian Tour qualifier, and we saw another give Plaisier a very close match on Monday. Nebrida has played in the last two World Championships and while he lost both his first round matches, he took two sets off both Danny Jensen and Simon Whitlock. Nebrida has a seasonal average of 86.14, and he is a four time winner on the 2024 Asian Tour.
Williams will need to be up for this as Nebrida has experience of playing here, so nerves are going to be less of an issue. He has come close to winning in the last two years and will be ready to go from the off. Williams is the better player and has a good record here, but he is unlikely to have things all his own way. I’ll take Nebrida to rise to the occasion once again and pick up at least a couple of sets.
2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening Tip: 1 point Paolo Nebrida to win +1.5 sets @ 2.50 with Betfair, Hills, BET365
Madars Razma vs. Christian Kist
Razma has lost five of his last ten matches and he is blowing hot and cold. Four sub 90 averages, and four 97+. It is hard to know what you are going to get from Madars right now, which doesn’t make for a great betting opportunity. His record at Ally Pally is not great. He has played in five previous championships and won three of his opening matches, including a 3-1 over Mike De Decker last year.
Christian Kist, a former BDO World Champion, has struggled with arthritis in his wrist. Sometimes he can turn up and barely be able to hold the dart, other times he is fine.
Challenge Tour
Kist plays on the Challenge tour, but also gets invites to Pro Tour events, so he is used to playing this level of opponent. He reached the semi-final of PC22 in September and the quarter final of PC26 in October but like Razma, he is not a model of consistency.
Kist has won three Challenge tour titles in 2024, and is third on the OOM, behind Scutt and Plaisier. He has played here on four previous occasions, but only won the one match. He has had some tough first round opponents, including Luke Littler last year, and MVG in 2017.
These two have met three times and Kist has won the lot. Two matches were way back in 2017, but he won their only match in 2024, a 6-2 win in PC21 in September. Razma is the 1.67 favourite, Kist 2.34.
Razma is the better player, but not by much. Kist has got the better of him in their previous matches and with both players very inconsistent, this has no bet written all over it.
2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening Tip: No Bet
Ricky Evans vs. Gordon Mathers
Gordon Mathers is not the man he was when we last saw him treading the Ally Pally stage in the 2022 Championship. He has lost a lot of weight and no longer has to iron his shirts on a wok.
He has played in three PDC world Championship but has not won a match. His seasonal average is 82.36, but in the last three months that has dropped to 80.43. He has never averaged above 82.65 in any of his three previous matches here.
Mathers is the last unseeded Antipodean left in the tournament. Joe Comito blew a really good chance to beat Thiabault Tricole in the opening match of the tournament, and Ben Robb was on the receiving end of the only ton plus average of the tournament so far, losing 0-3 to the impressive Conor Scutt.
Evans Needs To Win
Ricky Evans might want to get some slimming tips off Mathers, as Kettering’s finest has been trying to shed some timber for a while now. But before that, he needs to get the win, and he should. Evans has been a bit down on his darts, frustrated by a lack of progress. His seasonal win rate is just 46%. Worse still, he has won just one of his last fifteen matches. That is alarming and his confidence is in bits as a result.
Evans’ seasonal average is 93.06, and in the last three months 92.95, which is not terrible and is a lot better than Mathers. His checkout % has fallen to 35%, which is not good, and less than the 41% for Mathers. Evans looks likely to get to a finish first, but his ability to take those chances will decide the outcome of the match.
Finishing Frustrations
Evans has been hitting a lot of mid to high 90 averages and losing. That leads to frustration, the doubles look smaller, confidence gets worse and you have the classic downward spiral. This match gives him a great chance to finally get a win and move him into the second round and earn a vital £15k of ranking money.
Evans lost the final of PC16 in August, and that seems to have tipped him into the crisis he is now in. He has played twenty four matches since then and won just four.
The question is, can Evans relax enough to just play his game, get one of those 94 – 95 averages, and more importantly, hit some early doubles to settle the nerves? If he can, he is the better player and should win. If he misses a few doubles, gets down on himself, Mathers will have every chance to win. It is one of those matches which may be a better in running opportunity than betting before the off.
Solid Ally Pally Record
Evans has played in nine World Championships and won seven of his first round matches, including his last five, so he has positive mental associations with Ally Pally, certainly better than Mathers’ three defeats.
Evans is a completely unbackable 1.20 to win the match. Sorry, but those odds are nuts for a player whose confidence is in tatters. Yes, this is a great chance to get a win, but it might only take a missed double or two, at the wrong time, and that spiral of doom kicks in.
Is Mathers good enough to win? Probably not, but this is not really about Mathers. It is about Evans and how he can handle the situation. I will have risky handicap bet on Mathers. I just can’t back a player who has won just one of his last fifteen matches.
2025 PDC WC Wednesday Evening Tip: 1 point Gordon Mathers to win +1.5 sets @ 2.75 with Ladbrokes, Bet365
Nathan Aspinall vs. Leonard Gates
Gates came out of his match with Cameron Menzies as the winner, but it was a match notable for Menzies breakdown. He wasn’t in a good place mentally and that just got worse as the match got away from him.
Gates did well to stick to his task. It would have been easy to get distracted by your opponent crying on stage, but Gates did his job and won 3-1. He only averaged 82.96, his eleventh sub 90 average in a row.
We should not be expecting too much from Gates. He made the second round here two years ago, beating Geert Nentjes 3-1 in the first round, before losing 1-3 to Stephen Bunting in the next.
Confident Asp
Aspinall has been talking a good game. He says that he is fit again and that 2025 is going to be a big year for him. The work is going in, and so long as he can stay injury free, he thinks he can get back to his best.
He hasn’t been able to practice as much as he would have liked while recovering from his latest injury, and he had to take a few months off, not even picking a dart up. It takes time to get back from that. He is not there yet and that is why he is looking at 2025, rather than a deep run in this Championship.
Dartitis
The Asp is also dealing with Dartitis, so his problems are complicated and it shows in his form. His win rate in 2024 is just 53% and he has lost six of his last ten matches. However, he was up against sone very good payers, such as Littler, Humphries, Michael Smith, Menzies and Doets. All better than Gates. His consistency is not what he wants, but his average in the last three months is a shade under 95.
Aspinall is the 1.20 favourite and he has only lost one second round match here in his six previous World Championships. That was a 0-3 loss to Ricky Evans last year.
It is hard to see anything but a win for Aspinall, but could Gates get a set on the board, as he did against Bunting two years ago? Half the matches played so far have ended 3-1, and only two have required a deciding set. I won’t put it past Gates to win a set, but the win goes to Aspinall. The Asp has always conceded at least one set in his second round matches here.
