The European Championship of Darts starts up on October 26th and runs through to the 29th. This latest edition of the tournament, which is still somewhat in its infancy as this will be just the tenth edition of it, is being contested out in Belgium with the winner walking off with £100,000 in prize money. There are some notable names missing from this line up though with Phil Taylor, Gary Anderson, Adrian Lewis and Raymond van Barneveld not taking part.
That is because they either didn’t compete in the qualifying tournaments, or they didn’t do well enough in them to get to the Championships. The European Championships is a rewarding final tournament for those who have performed the best over the twelve European Tour events across the season. The top 32 players, sorted by prize money from the twelve events get to take part at the European Championships and heading up the somewhat weakened field is Michael van Gerwen who is a price of 4/5 at bet365 to win the event outright.
European Championship Darts Odds
Michael van Gerwen 4/5, Peter Wright 4/1, Daryl Gurney 16/1, Rob Cross 18/1, Mensur Suljovic 18/1, Michael Smith 25/1, Dave Chisnall 28/1, Simon Whitlock 33/1, bar 66/1
Michael van Gerwen
The big Dutchman is the market leader and with good reason because he has won the last three editions of the European Championships. Between him and Phil Taylor they have won seven of the previous nine editions of the tournament, so you would imagine that without Taylor, he should have a clear run. However, Mighty Mike has been having some performance issues in the game recently. It sort of all started after he had failed to defend his Premier League title.
After that, MVG suffered a heavy loss against Phil Taylor at the World Matchplay, and then surprisingly failed to get out of the group stage at the Champions League of Darts to follow that up with, taking a heavy hit against fellow countryman Raymond van Barneveld as well as suffering another loss against Taylor in that group stage. He then suffered his first first-round exit of the World Grand Prix since 2009 as he was dumped out by John Henderson. He’s Not been on point, but he has tournament form.
Peter Wright
The Scotsman has had a great season, particularly on the European tour. One of his big moments this year came in the Premier League Final when he had a 7-2 lead over Van Gerwen, but couldn’t hold out as MVG came back at him. Wright missed some crucial doubles under pressure in that game. He won the UK Open this year and was runner up to Taylor at the World Matchplay too and claimed the Players Championship. Wright won five European Tour titles this season two of them against Michael Van Gerwen in the final. It’s been a great season from Snakebite and will seriously oppose Van Gerwen on the opposite side of the draw as the second seed.
Others
Mensur Suljovic after winning the Premier League in his debut season will be one of the dark horses in the field, his first success at a major TV event. He had quarter final appearances at the Masters and the World Matchplay and ran to the semi finals of the World Grand Prix as well recently. Northern Ireland’s Daryl Gurney will be another dark horse worth considering as he recently claimed his first ever PDC title in beating Kim Huybrechts to land the Players Championship against the odds. He can add a semi final at the UK Open and the World Matchplay as well to that.
European Championship Darts Prediction
The value appears to just be on Peter Wright to collect the title here. Michael van Gerwen has been out of sorts and therefore with an amped up Snakebite, who has done so well on the European Tour this season, chomping at the bit, the Scotsman can take this. He has already proven this season that he can get the better of the best in the game.
