Betfred World Matchplay 2025 Predictions: Cool Hand to retain title?

The Betfred World Matchplay is one of the most prestigious events on the darting calendar and as regular title sponsor, Betfred are going straight at the bull with their promotions and content!

Our darts expert Sean Rafferty will have daily tips and price boosts on his selections, but first here are his outright Betfred World Matchplay 2025 predictions. 

History, Location and Format

The 2025 PDC Betfred World Matchplay is the 32nd running of this PDC event, having been first held in 1994. The tournament is seen the second biggest tournament of the season, after the World Championships.

As always, the World Matchplay will be held at the world-famous Winter Gardens in Blackpool, with this year's event running from Saturday 19th to Sunday 27th June and will be shown live and exclusively on Sky Sports.

The matchplay format of legs rather than sets means that you are never really out of a match and can result in some incredible comebacks.

The field is comprised of 32 players, with the top 16 players on the PDC Werner Order of Merit seeded for the tournament. The top 16 players on the ProTour Order of Merit, not to have already qualified on the cut-off date will be unseeded.

Despite running for 31 years, the event has only had 13 champions, with Phil Taylor winning the title an incredible 16 times and the only other multiple winners being Michael van Gerwen (three times) and Rod Harrington (twice).

The defending champion is Luke Humphries, having beaten van Gerwen 18-15 in the 2024 final.

Prize Money

There is a prize fund of £800,000 on offer to the 32 qualifiers.

Draw

Betfred World Matchplay Odds

4.5 units Luke Humphries to win @ 4/1

This has been a certified pick for a couple months now, I just needed a backable price and we’ve certainly got that at 4/1. I can’t really fathom why Littler is less than half the odds at 15/8, when on paper you’d have to say Humphries has had a better year so far - Humphries has won the Premier League, World Masters and US Masters. Whereas Littler has won the UK Open and a Euro Tour event since winning the World Championship at the very start of January. There’s obvious hype around Littler but Humphries looks far better value and has previous form here to back up his chances, it was a no brainer to make him my headline outright selection.

As Humphries has rose up the rankings the past couple years, his results at the Winter Gardens have improved - he made the semi finals here in 2023, before winning his first Matchplay title last year. It was an absolute masterclass from Cool Hand, averaging 100+ in all five of his matches and nobody coming within three legs of beating him.

He does have a tricky opening match, drawing one of the best unseeded players in Gian Van Veen, but up until a win for Van Veen in March, Humphries had won all four of their previous meetings and will believe if he plays to the best of his ability he’ll come out on top, then you’ll see his odds shorten significantly.

If he doesn’t get put out early doors then I think Humphries will be extremely tough to beat. By the quarter finals it’s best of 31 legs, it can turn into a stamina test as much as anything and Humphries is better equipped than almost anyone else, as he keeps himself fit away from the oche, which could prove important heading into the latter stages of the tournament.

For someone who’s been so consistent in the majors, 4/1 is a very generous price for a worthy world number one, as he looks to win back-to-back Matchplay titles.

2.5 units Gerwyn Price to win @ 8/1

I had been pretty keen on Josh Rock in this section of the draw, until I saw his odds of 14/1, which put me off pretty quickly. I’d be wanting 20/1 or higher for someone who hasn’t particularly done anything of note in majors before, however impressive his performances have been this year.

Price looks to be the best value in this quarter at 8/1, it has shortened over the past couple of weeks and rightly so. After winning the Baltic Sea Darts Open last weekend, he’s now won more titles in the PDC this year than anybody else, racking up five in total. The form is very much there - since the start of June, he made the final of the World Cup for Wales with Jonny Clayton, losing in a deciding leg to Northern Ireland. In his last four events, he won the Poland Masters, went semi-final followed by a final in two PC events, then won the European Tour event at the weekend.

One of the things I’ve been most impressed about with Price recently is his attitude on the oche, even when he’s been up against it or looking like he could lose, he hasn’t dropped the head or felt sorry for himself, like I feel he has been guilty of in the past. He’s kept a good temperament and fought his way back to win more times than not. Equally, he’s talking very positively about his game in interviews and seems to be making victory in Blackpool his main target.

The World Matchplay is one of the few majors Gezzy is yet to win, having already won the World Championship, World Grand Prix and Grand Slam. So I can understand why he’s singled this one out as one he really wants to get over the line in. His record in this isn’t the best, but he did make the final in 2022.

In his current form, I can’t think of many players who will beat Price. The biggest threat in his quarter will be Josh Rock I reckon, but as I say, he’s yet to make any real impact in the majors and hasn’t managed to win a match at the Winter Gardens yet in two previous appearances, Van Gerwen isn’t in the best of form lately and won’t threaten Price over a longer format unless he really improves on recent showings.

Again, the extended format should suit Price more than most others, given he is one of the fitter players and has lost a fair bit of weight recently, he’s looking after himself and that could pay off if he can get to the quarter finals or further. 8/1 is a good price for the most in-form player to lift his first
ever Matchplay title.

1 unit Jonny Clayton e/w (1/4 - 4 Places) @ 33/1

It’s a big week for Jonny, as he defends the prize money for making the final here two years ago. Although he has eased the pressure somewhat, having made the final of the World Masters at the start of the February.

As well as making the final of that World Masters, he also made the semi finals of the UK Open, as well as winning an event on both the European Tour and Pro Tour. The recent form is decent, averaging 107 and 103 in his final two matches on the European Tour at the weekend is enough evidence of that.

As well as the decent form, the section of the draw Jonny is in made him a more appealing bet - he faces Martin Schindler in the opening round which I fancy him to come through, he’d then face arguably just as easy a tie against one of Dave Chisnall or Mike De Decker in the last 16. Gary Anderson and Stephen Bunting are the main threats to him in that quarter, but Anderson hasn’t really managed to transfer his form on the Euro Tour and Pro Tour into the majors and Bunting has gone slightly off the boil for me.

33/1 is huge odds for The Ferret, considering he has a very winnable section of the draw, has previously been deep here already and is a proven major winner.

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