2023 Betfred World Matchplay Day Five Preview

Betfred World Matchplay Day Five Preview

We have four more darting battles at the Winter Gardens this evening

Michael Van Gerwen conquer, Brendan Dolan will take on Damon Heta in the opening game of the evening

Heat Faces Dolan

Brendan Dolan will be looking to follow up on his famous win over Michael van Gerwen when he faces Damon Heta on Wednesday evening.

Heta is also the power scorer of the two. He’s hit 250 maximums in 2023 compared to Dolan who’s registered 107 but it would be folly to completely right off Dolan again, given the Head to Head records of these two and the shenanigans witnessed on Sunday night, which serves as a reminder that any outcome is possible.

Dolan himself is in decent form having reached his third SF on the floor this year just last week, he also boasts the best doubles percentage on stage in this field in 2023 at 46.88% so there is things in his favour. Having said that I suspect Heta will have too much for him if he can avoid the mistakes MVG made against Dolan in the first round.

Dimi Looking For Another Quarter Final In Blackpool

Dimitri Van den Bergh will hoping to make the Quarter Finals once more in Blackpool to make it four in a row.

Jonny Clayton was certainly under par in his opening match against Gabriel Clemens and but for some iffy doubling early on from the ‘German Giant’ that score line could’ve been completely different. It was ‘The Ferret’ who advanced however despite his average winning leg being a mere 17.20 darts.

These two met three times in the Premier league this year and it was 2-1 in victories in favour of the Welshman who averaged higher of the two on all occasions and 100+ in two of them. They also met at the World Championships on New Year’s Day this year and it was Dimi who prevailed. He won 5-3 and his timing was perfect breaking in the seventh set, then holding his throw in the following set to advance.

Van Den Bergh reached this stage by defeating European Champion Ross Smith 10-8 in a high quality encounter first up on Monday evening. He fired in seven maximums against the big scoring Smith and hit 50% of his double to produce a match average of 101.24 in an impressive display.

Also on Night Five

2021 World Matchplay Champion Peter Wright will face Ryan Searle before we have an absolute barnstormer of a last game between new tournament favourite Luke Humphries and Dirk van Duijvenbode

Wednesday July 19 (1900 BST)

4x Second Round

Brendan Dolan v Damon Heta

Jonny Clayton v Dimitri Van den Bergh

Peter Wright v Ryan Searle

Luke Humphries v Dirk van Duijvenbode