Darts Betting Tips: Boosted double for Friday’s quarter-finals

Friday sees the second two quarter-final clashes at the Betfred World Matchplay take place, with Ross Smith facing Gerwyn Price and Gian van Veen taking on James Wade.

To celebrate our continued headline sponsorship, we've boosted our star darts tipster Sean Rafferty's selections and will continue to do daily throughout the tournament! Here are his Betfred World Matchplay quarter-final tips for Friday.

Ross Smith most 180s vs Gerwyn Price @ 20/21

Smith had a fortunate passage to the quarter-finals, although I’m sure he didn’t feel like that at the time. Sadly his last-16 opponent Cameron Menzies took ill on the stage just three legs into the match and had to go off, having been deemed unfit to continue play that night, he had to “retire” from the match, this meaning that Smith progressed to the quarter-finals.

Whether it’s a help or a hindrance having as good as night off from playing remains to be seen, in fact, it’ll be almost four days since he played a full match once he steps up the oche against Gezzy. Having a break may help but you also want to feel like you’re still a part of the tournament. He was excellent against Doets in the opening round and he started well against Menzies, he’ll look to just carry that form into this and he’ll have every chance.

Price knew that an improvement was a must against Cross if he was to progress any further in Blackpool, he certainly did that as he upped his average by four points from the first round as he breezed past Rob in an 11-5 victory. The promising thing for The Iceman is it looked like he still has a couple of gears to go up and I do think the further he goes the more he could strengthen as regains his confidence.

I’d say the match winner market has been priced up just about right, as I give Price the edge in this, simply because he’s more experienced at winning matches of this calibre than Ross is.

Where I do like Smudger to take the win is in the most 180s market - we all know he’s one of the biggest 180 hitters on tour and he’s lived up to that reputation this week, hitting 10 180s in 19 legs thus far. Price hasn’t been quite as frequent at hitting them, with 11 maximums in 36 legs. In all five matches they’ve played in-front of fans, it’s Ross who’s hit the most 180s, including a 13-3 win on them in their only previous Matchplay meeting in 2024.

Over 27.5 legs in Gian van Veen vs James Wade @ 8/11

What a mouth-watering prospect this match is, it has all the makings of a tightly-contested classic. Two very similar type players in my opinion - good doubles, efficient with combination checkouts and solid scorers. It’s a repeat of last year where the two met in the same round at the Winter Gardens, Wade came out on top that time with a 16-13 win.

Van Veen’s all-Dutch clash in the last 16 against the high flying Wessel Nijman promised a lot and it certainly delivered. This could be a rivalry for years to come and if this match sets the tone for that then we have a lot to look forward to. Van Veen recovered from a few precarious positions and eventually got over the line with a gutsy 14-12 victory. A 148 checkout to essentially stay in the match was the main highlight from Gian as he showed just how much bottle he has.

Wade had a much smoother path to this point, defeating Ryan Searle 11-8 on Wednesday night. Although on paper it looks a tight match, it always felt like Wade was in control of the match and just kept Searle at arms length for the majority of the contest. It felt fairly ordinary but it was an average just shy of the 100 mark for The Machine, as he continues to remain one of the toughest players in the world to beat.

It feels almost impossible to separate these two and it’s hard to give either an edge other than Wade’s experience. James may take some encouragement from that win over GVV a year ago and I’d probably give him the edge. Whoever wins, it’s nigh on impossible to envisage anyone running away with it. All their longer format matches have been close and I see this one being no different.

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