2022 European Darts Open Preview

No sooner than one Euro Tour event has finished, than the next one starts. It is back to Germany for this weekend’s 2022 European Darts Open from Leverkusen. The tournament was last held in 2019. Michael van Gerwen has won it four times and is going for a hat trick. Peter Wright has won it twice and been runner up the MVG twice. It is also the scene of both Van Gerwen and Wrights first ever Euro tour titles.

Michael van Gerwen won last weekend’s Austrian Darts Open, his second Euro Tour title of the season and he is one of the few seeded players who is in good form.

Checking on the official Entry list as of 10.30am, the only withdrawal is Danny Baggish, who announced that he would not be playing for a couple of weeks, in order to attend to family matters back in the US. Now there’s a man who knows how to use social media.

2022 European Darts Open: Seeded Players

1.Gerwyn Price

Price hasn’t played in the last four Euro Tour events, but he did win the first. That means he has banked enough cash to be in third place in the European Championship OOM. He can afford not to play in many more and still make the final.

His recent form sees him slipping down the form rankings and he has lost six of his last ten. He lost to Michael Smith in Thursdays PL match, but in his favour, the European crowds tend to give him more respect and he will be allowed to play abuse free. That said, his floor form hasn’t been great for a while either.

2.Peter Wright

Another top seed who has lost his form. Wright may have a great tournament record, but he has lost eight of his last ten matches and has not won a Euro Tour title since 2017. He was very poor when losing 2-6 to Gary Anderson last night, averaging 87 and changing his darts mid match again. The form based FDI rankings now have Wright at 20th. That may be flattering.

3.Jose de Sousa

Continues to tread water, losing five of his last ten and he has won just one match from the first four Euro Tour events.

4.Joe Cullen

Had a great start to the season winning the Masters and two players championship events. His more recent form has petered out somewhat. The busy schedule of the Premier League, Euro Tour and Pro Tour has drained his batteries. He looked in better nick last weekend and reached the quarter final but had a nightmare on the doubles (1/13) to make is six defeats from his last twelve.

5.Michael van Gerwen

Picked up his second Euro Tour title of the year last weekend and his fourth ranked title in 2022. His scoring has been good all year, but it now looks like his confidence is returning. He is being helped by the fact that the other Big Beasts are off their game, but if starts to believe he is the man again, he is more likely to add more titles. However, his performance in last night’s PL showed that his underlying problem is still there. He misses too many important doubles.

6.Ryan Searle

Seems to be keeping his best form for the floor events. He has won a players championship event and been runner up in two more, but he has played six and won just two matches on the Euro Tour. Disappointing for a player of his potential.

7.Dimitri van den Bergh

Has lost six of his last ten matches and after reaching the quarter final of ET1 and ET2, he has fallen at the first fence in the last two. There are still some good performances, but he is not at his best.

8.Luke Humphries

He can be forgiven going out in his first match last weekend, perhaps suffering mental let down after winning his first Euro Tour title three weeks ago. He has won seven of his last ten matches and has won two ranking titles in 2022. Could well have another good run.

9.Brendan Dolan

Has lost all three of his Euro Tour matches in 2022 and despite reaching the semi-final if PC13, he is hard to fancy on the Euro Tour.

10. Rob Cross

Is winning plenty of matches and picking up good ranking money but his doubling has not been good enough to finish the job. He reached the quarter final last week but lost to Stephen Bunting, checking out at just 17%. He lost the quarter final of PC13 with a checkout rate of 17%, lost the semi-final of PC11 with a checkout rate of 25%, lost the semi-final of PC7 with 26%. Voltage is ranked 9th for checkout% over the last 12 months, but recently, his doubles have deserted him just when he needs them.

11. Damon Heta

Went out early last week with a rare poor display. He won PC5 in mid-March and has lost three semi-finals since then. Remains one of the best scorers and only MVG and Aspinall have better win rates in 2022. Can’t be written off on the back of one poor effort.

12. Jonny Clayton

The Ferret might be better off taking a leaf out of Gerwyn Price’s book and having a week off. He has been very successful in the Premier League and that means he is playing up to three matches on a Thursday night, travelling to Europe on Friday and playing again. He reached the semi-final of ET1, the quarter finals of ET2 & 3 and the third-round last week. Maybe he is getting a little jaded.

Clayton has racked up enough prizemoney to be in fourth place in the ET O.O.M. so he can safely take a time out. As one of the heaviest scorers in the game, he is always a threat, but it is nearly six months without a title. The Ferret picked up another PL night win last night and has done enough to be the first to qualify for the play offs. Clayton has won eight of his last ten matches and is in great form.

13. Dirk van Duijvenbode

Thrashed 1-6 in last weekend’s quarter-final by MVG. He won PC12 last month and he remains in good form, winning seven of his last ten, so he enters the equation.

14. James Wade

Has won seven of his last ten matches but his last Euro tour title was back in 2016. He needs to win five matches in a row to win the title and he hasn’t won five in a row since August 2021.

15. Krzysztof Ratajski

Remains inconsistent with very good performances followed by a duff one. A dangerous opponent rather than a potential winner.

16. Nathan Aspinall

Went into last weekend’s event in great form and reached the semi-final, but he never looked like winning. He only averaged 90 across his four matches and that won’t do. However, he has won ten of his last eleven matches and will be confident after winning PC13 last month. It would be ironic if, after getting good news regarding his fitness, that his scoring starts to tail off. Not without a chance, but he needs to find his soring boots.

2022 European Darts Open: Notable Unseeded Players

Martin Lukeman

Runner-up in ET3 as an unseeded player. He has been putting in some good performances despite a lack of fire power. He only averaged 90 in ET3 but that run has put him into sixth in the O.O.M. and he is well set for the rest of the season.

It is hard to see a repeat of that big run, but he has done enough to look forward to playing in the Players Championship finals, European Championship finals and World Championship. That will go a long way to make sure he keeps his tour card. He has picked up a decent draw and would face the out of form Jose de Sousa in the second round, should he beat Dennis Nilsson.

Stephen Bunting

Enjoyed a run to the semi-finals last weekend but like Aspinall, he didn’t play that well to get there, averaging 92.4. He will likely need to up his game to hope to emulate that result.

Martin Schindler

Surely Schindler will finally convert one of these German based Euro Tour events into big run? The two highest ranked players from the host nation get a place in the first round and that means Schindler and Clemens get an entry to no less than seven of the thirteen events, without having to go through qualifying. That is a minimum £7K in ranking prizemoney and Schindler is already looking good for the finals and Clemens just outside the cut of point. That really takes the pressure off.

Schindler has won seven of his last ten matches and has the 14th highest 12-month average. He has reached a players championship semi-final and final in the last 8 weeks and was a quarter finalist at the German Darts Grand Prix three weeks ago. He is giving himself chances and with many of the big guns not firing, he could have another good run.

Scott Williams

Tops the Challenge Tour OOM and has won three titles. He has also had a few entries into players championship events and reached the quarter final of PC 7. He has beaten the likes of James Wade, Daryl Gurney, Ryan Searle and Nathan Aspinall. This will be his ET debut and if nerves don’t get the better of him, he could cause a surprise in the early rounds.

Josh Rock

Only won the one match last week but he showed real promise. He is still cutting his teeth in the professional game, but he is making good progress and will be fun to watch again this week. He could have a better run given a decent draw. Rock faces an out of form Connor Scutt in the first round and if he wins that he is into a second-round match with Ratajski.

Ante Post Selections

It has been a bit frustrating for us on the Euro tour this season. Picking losing semi-finalists is frustrating but let’s see if there is any decent looking value this weekend.

With MVG now having won twice on the pro tour and Euro Tour, he has to be the favourite coming into a tournament where he has won four times and captured his first ever Euro Tour title back in 2013. Value at 6.00? Perhaps, but he looks set to face Jonny Clayton in third round and The Ferret is now 4-3 in 2022.

Gerwyn Price has won six European titles, but his recent form is off putting. Peter Wright is another tournament specialist, but he has lost eight of his last ten and is hard to fancy.

Damon Heta didn’t fire for last week and lost at the semi-final stage before that, but I’ll go again. His draw looks decent (hopefully it won’t change again this weekend).

Go In Again On The Asp

Nathan Aspinall had a good run for us last week, but he didn’t play well. He has been playing better than what he showed last week and is winning a lot of matches. He is a quality player and has what it takes to win these events. I’ll take another chance. He has a tough draw, if the draw doesn’t change, in the top quarter with Price, Aspinall and Dolan. I also fancy Humphries, which is a pain, but The Asp has a 2-0 H2H record with him, albeit very old form.

Dirk van Duijvenbode gets the final pick. He is in the second quarter of the draw, along with MVG, Cullen and Clayton. It is a tough group, but Cullen is beatable and whomever comes through the likely MVG/Clayton match may be a be jaded.

Damon Heta to win the 2022 European Darts Open 1 point e/w @ 23.00 with Hills, Betvictor, Fitzdares

Nathan Aspinall to win the 2022 European Darts Open 0.5 point e/w @ 26.00 generally available

Martin Schindler to win the 2022 European Darts Open 0.5 point e/w @ 67.00 generally available

Dirk van Duijvenbode to win the 2022 European Darts Open 0.5 point e/w @ 34.00 with Betvictor

Round by round coverage will be limited this weekend. We have a clash with the Miami GP which gets priority, but I’ll cover selected first round matches and the second round, hopefully the third round but nothing beyond that.

-JamesPunt