Tennis Betting Advice - December 2024

It's time for a festive 33/1 shot...

Thursday 5th December 2024

Before we get down to some festive sport, a bit of housekeeping to tell you about…

In case you missed it, we’re now called Spa Publishing Group. Ones to Watch and our range of sports betting products was previously published by Oxfordshire Press. The new company delivers the SAME services, and the SAME websites, from the SAME people (including very much, yours truly).

You don’t need to do anything, other than keep an eye out for our new name, Spa Publishing Group, appearing in your inbox…

I just wanted to clear that up as it has transpired that last weekend we had a few email issues. If you haven’t done so already in recent weeks, the advice is to click on the relevant ‘Not Junk’ (or similar) button for this email, just to let your inbox/ email provider know that you ‘trust’ messages from us, and want to receive them (!).

You’d be helping us out by adding our new sending address to your Whitelist/ Safe List in your email contacts:

mail@onestowatch.spapublishinggroup.co.uk

Thanks!

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I said I’d be in touch intermittently before the start of the new tennis season in January. And here I am. Today, I want to talk to you about darts…

From Wimbledon to the Ally Pally…

As I’ve said before when dabbling in the golf Majors, I like to keep an eye out for outsider prices and Ones to Watch-style Each Way opportunities on promising young or potentially underrated players, across a variety of sports.

Along with tennis and golf, another individual sport that I enjoy watching is darts. Especially when the big tournaments come along. And when it comes to the arrows, they simply don’t come any bigger than the PDC Championship

There are a few similarities with the tennis Grand Slams here. With Wimbledon of course being the most famous of them all:

  • The iconic London venue - Wimbledon for the tennis, Alexandra Palace for the darts…

  • The annual sense of occasion - the hallowed turf and summer evenings of SW19, the raucous atmosphere and festive frivolities of the Ally Pally…

  • The history of great champions - eight-time Wimbledon winner Roger Federer, 16-time PDC champion Phil Taylor…

And when it comes to Each Way betting, another key similarity for me is the draw

Tennis tournaments are divided into two halves, the draw is published, and you can use it to map out who might play who, and plot a potential path to the final.

It’s the same with the PDC Championship, with the draw-sheet allowing us to see who might reach the final from their side of the schedule…

The PDC Championship 2025 starts next weekend, 15th December, and runs to 3rd January. It’s all live on Sky Sports every day and night, and can provide some great winter-warmer entertainment around the annual Christmas TV specials…

I won’t run through the full PDC draw and betting list, as I’m really no expert here. But from looking at the sheet in the same way that I approach a tennis tournament, there is one player and price that catches my eye. Here’s my festive pick for the darts…

Back a former champ at a big price…

Two years ago, we landed a darts winner here with the 11/1 ‘Name the Finalists’ combo of Michael van Gerwen and Michael Smith. With the latter going on to win the tournament…

This year’s PDC Championship draw is an interesting one, in that it pairs the top two in the betting - and last year’s finalists - in the same half. That means that at best, only one of 2/1 Luke Littler (still just 17 years of age), and reigning champion Luke Humphries at 3/1, can make the final…

That scenario instantly makes the opposite side of the draw of great interest to me from an outsider-betting stance…

The man I like the look of here at the price - 33/1 Each Way - is the champion from just two years ago, Michael Smith. ‘Bully Boy’ hit the skids early in his title defence last Christmas (not the first defending champ to do so, and he won’t be the last).

Returning to the Ally Pally this December, Smith at 33/1 quite simply stands out as a big price for a recent former winner of the most prestigious, high-pressure event in darts. And with the draw being as it is, the 34-year-old could go deep here…

Darts, PDC World Championship 2025:

  • Michael Smith is top-price 33/1 Each Way with Ladbrokes, Coral, Unibet, BetUK, BetMGM, LiveScoreBet, Star Sports

Each Way terms: 1/2 odds 1-2 places.

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Back to tennis - I’m working on my annual Ones to Watch report, and will report back with your new 2025 player list before Christmas…

Best wishes,

Tom Wilson

Oliver Upstone

Ones to Watch