World Series of Darts Finals 2017 Betting Odds & Preview

Draw favours Anderson in Glasgow

Darts Betting

The culmination of the season-long event that is the World Series of Darts kicks into action on November 3rd and will go through to the final on the 5th of the month. After seven tournaments in the World Series of Darts hosted throughout the season, the best performers overall from those events get to book themselves a spot as a top eight seed for the tournament, which is being hosted in Glasgow. The benefit of that is that the seeds start in the second round.

But this is a bigger field with 24 names in the mix in total including reigning champion Michael van Gerwen, who is the only player to have ever won the tournament. That is because this is just the third edition of the PDC event and Van Gerwen won both previous finals over Peter Wright.

Qualification

Across the course of the PDC season, there are seven World Series tournaments played. It started with the Dubai Masters back in May and included the Shanghai Masters, the US Masters, the Auckland Masters, the Melbourne Masters, the Perth Masters and the German Masters. The top eight players from those seven tournaments get seeded for the World Series of Darts Finals.

Making up the rest of the field then are the next four highest ranked PDC Order of Merit players, four PDC International Invitations and eight Tour Card Qualifiers who came through an event in Barnsley towards the beginning of October. The eight seeds all take a berth in the second round and therefore in the first round, the other sixteen players go through a one-match knockout to face up against one of the seeds in that second round.

World Series of Darts Finals Odds

Michael van Gerwen 10/11, Gary Anderson 9/2, Peter Wright 7/1, Rob Cross 20/1, Raymond van Barneveld 20/1, Mensur Suljovic 20/1, Daryl Gurney 20/1, bar 33/1.

Seedings

1 Gary Anderson
2 Michael van Gerwen
3 Peter Wright
4 Raymond van Barneveld
5 James Wade
6 Daryl Gurney
7 Kyle Anderson
8 Gerwyn Price

The Draw

The eight seeds for the tournament are kept apart in the second round of the draw and that is really where to start looking for the betting. The bottom half is easily the most competitive of the draw and that is because Michael van Gerwen and Peter Wright are there and they would be on a for a smile final clash. But the in-form Daryl Gurney is a player that neither are going to want to meet and Rob Cross, who showed up well in the recent European Championship are in there too.

The top half of the draw is where the top seed Gary Anderson is playing but he could get one of the trickier matches to open with if he faces up to Mensur Suljovic in the second round of action. Raymond Van Barneveld could clash with James Wade in the quarterfinals, but still, it is Anderson who looks the most likely to go the furthest there.

Gary Anderson

Anderson collected two World Series titles this season, opening with a win in the Dubai Masters with a victory over Michael van Gerwen and then he collected his second title in the series by winning the Perth Masters in August over Raymond van Barneveld. He missed out on the recent European Championships so should be chomping at the bit here to get into action.

Michael van Gerwen

Van Gerwen returned to winning ways recently in collecting the European Championship title and he needed that after some pretty poor misfires in recent tournaments by his standards. He did have quite a favourable draw though and he made the most of it, really only getting challenged by Australia’s Kyle Anderson in the semi’s. Van Gerwen reached the first three finals of the World Series tournaments this season, losing against Anderson in the Dubai Masters before picking up the Shanghai Master and the US Masters back to back. He didn’t make it back to any other final for the season though in the Series. MVG is the 10/11 outright favourite at Bet365.

Peter Wright

The Scotsman has failed twice in the final of the World Series of Darts Final and must be a little frustrated.  Both times was against MVG who he must be sick of. Wright finished the World Series with a bang in crushing Phil Taylor in the final of the German Masters at the end of October so his spirits should be high. That was revenge for having lost to Taylor in the Melbourne Masters Finals. He has been in decent form for a while and hit the quarter finals of the recent European Championships.

The Rest

Daryl Gurney continues to impress this season and ran to the semi finals of the European Championships, beating Peter Wright in the quarter finals in a fantastic performance. He did also reached the final of the US Masters in the World Series where he gave Michael van Gerwen a good run for his money before falling short in the end. He’s not a bad outside shot at the moment, while Rob Cross on the back of his fantastic run at the European Championship, beating Gurney and Dave Chisnall on his way to the final, will have appeal. Unfortunately, both are in the stacked bottom half of the draw.

World Series of Darts Finals Prediction

The win at the European Championship by Van Gerwen may be an ominous sign that he could be back on top of his game and he is going to be in contention here to defend his title once more. He’s not bad value to do so. Because of how stacked the bottom half of the draw is, Gary Anderson at 9/2 with bet365 offers value to have a good run at this through the easier top half and considering his good form in the World Series 2017.