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Premier League Darts, Week 8 - 26/3/09

Week 8 of the Premier League darts took place in front of a strangely muted audience in Birmingham. Maybe it was due to the earlier than usual 6.30pm start time, but the first match of the night started with the distracting backdrop of the Birmingham crowd still searching for their seats as they hurried from work into the cavernous National Indoor Arena.

This cannot have been good news for Wayne Mardle, whose entire game plan these days seems to be to rely on an intoxicated, boisterous late-night crowd to succeed in putting off his unfortunate opponent. You got the impression that a soulless, half-empty arena on the outskirts of Birmingham wasn’t quite the kind of sort of atmosphere he was looking for.

A quiet night at the darts was exactly what I was looking for though spread betting-wise, as I had chosen to SELL TOTAL 180s ON THE NIGHT AT 24.75. Selling 180s is never a particularly fun bet, especially for the casual punter, who in general would prefer to buy and cheer each 180 as it comes in. Having done the same spread bet earlier this year, I remember going along to the World Championships at Alexandra Palace and being the stick-in the-mud of our group, the only person who’d stay in his seat when a 180 was thrown instead of cheering like a simpleton and waving around a cheap sign.

Still, no-one said betting was supposed to be fun. Winning, however, most certainly is and I was confident on this occasion. In the previous seven weeks of the Premier League, total 180s had made up under this quote four times. What’s more, total 180s dropped from a monstrous 34 in Week 6 to just 20 in Week 7 and I was hopeful that this trend would continue.

DURING THE NIGHT

The subdued atmosphere worked a treat in the first match, as Mardle and Mervyn King combined for just three 180s. King managed to destroy Mardle 8-2, leaving very little time for either player to throw in their expected number of 180s. The next match was a far better contest, with Jelle Klaasen coming from behind to defeat Terry Jenkins 8-6.

This was one of those horrible games where the first two darts from each player kept nestling into the treble-20 bed, leaving the committed seller permanently on the verge of a heart attack. Fortunately, both players had also mastered the art of the stray third dart, meaning a lot of 140s, or indeed 121s and 125s, but very few 180s – just three, in fact, over the 14 legs of the contents.

With a running total of six from two matches, my sell was very much onside, meaning I had a massive 18 ¾ 180s to play with in the remaining two matches. The last thing I needed, then, was an absolute bonanza in the next match, as John Part and James Wade produced a match brimming with quality, and some very heavy scoring.

Ten 180s later, and the bet was now much less onside than I would have liked. To make things worse, the final match of the evening was Phil Taylor vs Raymond van Barneveld, a contest that had 180s-fest written all over it.

As it transpired, the match between the two old rivals had more in common with King’s hammering of Mardle earlier in the evening, than the classic 2007 final which Barney won 7-6. This time, Barneveld looked strangely out of sorts and suffered a veritable thrashing at Taylor’s hands, losing 8-2. Again, the short match worked in my favour – the 10 legs produced five 180s, leaving the total for evening at 21 and me with a decent 3.75 points profit – and a feeling of great relief.

JW

Newcastle v Arsenal, Premier League - 20/3/09

Newcastle, despite being quite dull and poor, have been on TV a lot recently for some reason. As for Arsenal, it's seemed at times this year like every single match they struggle to break down defensive opponents and end up drawing 0-0. So I wasn't massively looking forward to Newcastle v Arsenal, especially when I heard that the Magpies were going to drop their main goalscorer Michael Owen and play Oba Martins on his own up front.

The match started completely differently to how I expected however, with both teams attacking incisively and creating chances. Martins missed two good opportunities, Van Persie somehow contrived not to score when through on goal, and the lively Arshavin almost scored goal of the season after a driving run and thunderous long range shot. To cap it all, Martins then missed a penalty.

All of this was in the first half, remarkably it was still 0-0 at the break. Newcastle's excellent young defender Sebastian Bassong had gone off injured, so they'd had to bring Habib Beye off the bench for the first time in months, and move Steven Taylor in from right back to centre back. The game looked like goals in every way. The spread quotes at half time were 1.3-1.5 - I didn't think the bookmakers had reacted enough to the openness of the game and Bassong's injury. I really thought that 1.5 for the rest of the game looked low, so BOUGHT TOTAL GOALS AT 1.5.

It's difficult to tell after a lively first half if things will carry on in the same way. Often, the momentum of the game can be stopped by the half-time interval and it's more disjointed after the break. There were still a few chances early on in the second half, but it wasn't as extreme as the first period.

However, Nicklas Bendtner did, after a while, put Arsenal ahead with a header from a free kick. Fortunately, before Newcastle's heads had time to go down they'd equalised through Martins, just one minute after they'd gone behind. So I'd already won by half a goal, with over half an hour left and Arsenal needing the win and pushing forward.

Things looked even better for the bet when Steven Taylor went down injured, leaving Newcastle with just one recognised centre-back in the team, Coloccini. While he was off the field receiving treatment, Abou Diaby burst through a Taylor-shaped gap in the centre of defence to make it 2-1. Taylor was substituted for Michael Owen, obviously an attacking move, which meant the returning Beye had to go in central defence for the rest of the game.

We all know that Arsenal are not the sort of team to ease off when they're ahead. They've given out a lot of absolute hammerings in the last few years and I was hopeful that Newcastle's low confidence would yield more goals for the Gunners. Nasri scored again three minutes after Diaby, but unfortunately there weren't any more, even though Arsenal had several chances to extend their lead further. I was slightly lucky with Taylor's injury, but the buy of goals at 0-0 at half time turned out to be an excellent 2.5 point winner.

AR

Cheltenham Gold Cup - 13/3/09

The hype which preceded the 2009 Cheltenham Gold Cup was extraordinary, comparable only to, well, last year’s. Then, just like this time, stable mates Kauto Star and Denman were the talk of the track. The pair, who are both products of the Paul Nicholls yard, headed the betting once again, with Kauto Star a strong favourite to avenge his 2008 defeat and become the first horse to regain the Gold Cup.

My interest in the race lay outside of the top two. I had been excitedly following the progress of another Nicholls’ contender, Neptune Collonges, who had displayed some impressive form since his third place in the 2008 Gold Cup, twice winning out of high quality fields in Punchestown and Leopardstown. In his only other recent race, last December, Neptune had been comfortably leading until an unfortunate fall two fences out handed the race to the Jonjo O’Neill-trained Exotic Dancer.

Such impressive form had been enough to see Neptune vying with Denman for second favouritism (behind Kauto Star) for the renewal of the most prestigious race on the jumps calendar. However, in the hours leading up to the Gold Cup, Neptune was friendless, drifting out to a starting price of 15/2, only marginally ahead of his old and, in my view, inferior rival, Exotic Dancer, who had come into 8/1.

Spread betting gives you so many different ways of getting with a horse, instead of simply backing it to win. I could have bought Neptune at 10 on one spread betting firm’s race index, which, in the case of the Gold Cup, would pay 4 places, 50-30-20-10. Instead, I chose to back him in a matchbet and so BOUGHT NEPTUNE COLLONGES / EXOTIC DANCER AT 1.5.

In effect I was giving Exotic Dancer a one and a half-length start over my horse: for every length over this by which Neptune defeated his old adversary, I would (hopefully) win one point, with a maximum make-up of +/- 15.

DURING THE RACE

If only the Gold Cup lasted two miles instead of just over three! Christian Williams sent Neptune Collonges out to the front of the pack, where he stayed for much of the race, while Tony McCoy gave Exotic Dancer such a patient ride that he propped up the rear of the field, behind even the rank outsiders. As we approached the last third of the race, all that was to change.

Neptune continued to plod along at his own pace, even while Kauto Star and Denman noticeably quickened. McCoy, meanwhile, had also found more from Exotic Dancer. And so followed an agonising process in which the two horses appeared to be moving through space and time in opposite directions. Neptune’s lead dwindled from 10 to five lengths, and then to parity. At this stage, there was only sadly one winner, as Exotic Dancer forced his way into third place, leaving a tired-looking Neptune some six lengths back, and me with a 7.5-point loser.

Neptune’s owner, John Hales, later blamed the jockey for not thrashing his horse out aggressively enough at the start and running the likes of Exotic Dancer out of the race early on. In my view, it was the good-to-soft ground that proved his undoing; on anything heavier, his staying stamina would have told over Exotic Dancer, as it had done previously. On this occasion, though, it was sadly not to be.

JW

Juventus v Chelsea, Champions League last 16 second leg - 10/3/09

Second legs of big Champions League ties are usually a lot more fun than the turgid affairs you get in the first legs, and I was hoping this would be the case for Juventus v Chelsea. The first leg had been uninspiring, with Chelsea notching a fairly routine 1-0 win thanks to Drogba.

The Old Lady put out an attacking line-up for the second leg though, with forward Vincenzo Iaquinta playing on the wing with Trezeguet and Del Piero up front. Juventus started really well, looking to take the game to Chelsea and looking the better side, although you know that a team of Chelsea's quality is always going to have good spells in the game at some stage.

Nedved went off injured, which looked like it might damage Juve's attacking threat, but Iaquinta scored to level the tie on 19 minutes with a nice finish. After this Chelsea started to get into the game and were attacking with menace down the left hand side, while Juventus still looked dangerous on the break. I've always thought the public perception of Italian defences being really solid is a bit of a myth, I've seen many Italian sides holding a lead from the previous leg get absolutely thrashed, for instance Man Utd 7-1 Roma, Deportivo 4-0 Milan, Inter 1-5 Arsenal and Lazio 1-5 Chelsea.

Despite Nedved's absence the game looked really open to me at this stage, and I was surprised to see one spread betting firm's total goals quote lower than everyone else's at 2.5-2.7. There's no other way to put it than that the game looked like it would yield more goals than that, so I went for an in-running BUY OF TOTAL GOALS AT 2.7.

A buy of goals is obviously a very fun bet if it starts going well. Chelsea were piling the pressure on at the end of the half, and looked to have the ball over the line from Drogba's free kick, but the officials adjudged that Buffon had scrambled it away just in time. Shortly after Chelsea took the lead when Lampard's lob came down off the bar and Essien bundled it in on his comeback from a long injury.

Essien's energy in the first half had made a difference and Chelsea deserved their equaliser. This put me in a great position for my goals buy, with Juventus forced to attack for the rest of the game and Chelsea looking dangerous on the break.

There were chances in the second half, but nothing happened until the 71st minute when Chiellini was sent off for two yellows. He'd hacked Drogba from behind when on a yellow, an absolutely ridiculous challenge considering the way the tie was balanced. One would assume that Juve's heads would start to go down after this, but they were given a penalty for handball a few minutes later.

The referee had lost control of the game at this point, with players pushing and shoving and Del Piero somehow still uncautioned despite five or six tackles that should have got him a card. Del Piero rolled it in to put the score at 2-1, Chelsea ahead on away goals and Juventus on ten men.

Juve still piled forward, with young forward Seb Giovinco, nicknamed 'The Atomic Ant' due to his diminuitive stature, having a positive effect on the game. They didn't score though, and Chelsea caught Juventus on the break with seven minutes left as Drogba got another goal, and it was game over. A good 1.3 profit from this.

AR

Phil 'the Power' Taylor v James Wade, Premier League Darts - 26/2/09

Week Three saw the biggest shock of the Premier League Darts so far. On an epic Thursday night in Coventry, a mere mortal had sent tremors through the world of sport by upsetting the great Phil ‘the Power’ Taylor. For the first time since Week Nine of the 2008 Premier League, the Taylor juggernaut had been brought to a temporary halt.

Then, as now, the perpetrator was the Terry Jenkins (a man rather unfairly maligned by commentator Sid Waddell as having ‘all the charisma of your local dustman’), who had summoned up all of his might to hold Taylor to a 7-7 draw. Yes, a draw, not even a defeat, but then with Taylor as short as 1/12 with some fixed odds firms to win the match, it was still a massive surprise.

In contrast to Taylor, who is deemed to be struggling if his three-dart average ever drops below 100, James ‘The Machine’ Wade was having a terrible time, which may or may not have been related to his fledgling relationship with Helen Chamberlain (of Soccer AM fame).

A disappointing World Championships, where he reached the semi-finals almost in spite of his own poor play, was followed by a dismal start to the Premier League that left him languishing near the bottom of the table with just one point from two games. However, the same week that Jenkins drew with Taylor, Wade pulled off his best result in months, rallying from a 1-4 deficit to charge past Raymond van Barneveld by eight legs to four, averaging 120 in the final 6 legs and generally playing like a man possessed by the spirit of, well, Phil Taylor.

Week Four of the Premier League came around last Thursday and brought Taylor and Wade together. I was expecting some sort of reaction, possibly even an over-reaction to the previous week’s events, and, without having seen the prices, was naturally edging towards getting with Taylor. Instead, to my surprise, it was almost as if nothing had happened: Taylor was still an overwhelming, almost prohibitively-priced favourite. Wade’s stunning comeback against Barneveld seemed to have been ignored, dismissed as a meaningless blip in form, just like Taylor’s draw with Jenkins.

I, however, saw their respective performances as indicative of something rather more significant, especially in Wade’s case, and decided to BUY WADE’S 25:10 AT 4.5. This market makes up 25 in the event of your player winning, 10 for a draw and 0 if he loses. For a relatively small downside, I had the chance to win either 5.5 or 20.5 points.

DURING THE MATCH

It is rare in sport, and probably even rarer in betting, that a match pans out exactly as you would hope, but Taylor vs Wade was one of those wonderful occasions. As it turned out, Wade had not just built on his performance against Barney in Week Three, but undergone a thorough rejuvenation. Gone was the hesitant, discombobulated thrower of recent months; in his place, the fearless young southpaw who seasoned darts experts once proclaimed the dominant force of the game’s future.

The capacity crowd in Belfast watched on, astonished, as Wade took a 4-2 lead into the mid-session interval and never relented, closing out the match with a glorious 138 finish to hand a shell-shocked Taylor a heavy 8-4 defeat. Even the Power admitted afterwards, in a rare display of magnanimity towards a fellow professional, that “James was the better man.” And indeed, the better man to bet on, as it turned out.

JW