The 2024 Premier League has reached its finale with the top four players from this year’s league campaign ready to toe the oche at the play-offs at London’s O2.
Debutants Luke Littler and Luke Humphries top the standings going into the semi-finals with The Nuke taking on fourth-placed Michael Smith in the first match.
Those two are followed on to the stage by world champion Humphries, who plays the seven-time winner and current title-holder Michael van Gerwen. Both semis are over 19 legs with the winners going on to meet in the best-of-21 legs final.
- MICHAEL SMITH TO BEAT LUKE LITTLER
- LUKE HUMPHRIES TO WIN/MOST 180s DOUBLE V MICHAEL VAN GERWEN
- LUKE HUMPHRIES TO WIN THE PREMIER LEAGUE
Smith To Put Littler In His Place
Michael Smith and Luke Littler have met seven times in this year’s Premier League with Bully Boy winning five of those encounters.
The most recent was last week when Smith won 6-5 en route to landing Night 16 honours and booking his place in the play-offs.
Yet in spite of showing that the former world champ and Premier League runner-up clearly has the measure of the oche’s boy wonder, Smith is still a huge outsider for their opening semi-final, and on value grounds alone has to be the bet.
Littler seems immune from pressure and will doubtless give a good account of himself in his first ever Premier League play-offs. But Smith showed bottle galore last Thursday to make it to this point and on that form as much as his head-to-head record, he looks seriously overpriced.
MICHAEL SMITH TO BEAT LUKE LITTLER
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Cool Hand Has Measure of Mighty Mike
The second semi-final pits Luke Humphries against Michael van Gerwen and, just as with the first, head-to-head form points to a clear victor.
This time, however, that likely winner is also the rock-solid favourite.
World champ and world No.1 Humphries has beaten Van Gerwen in each of their last six meetings over the past two months, most recently in Sheffield last Thursday when Cool Hand went on to reach the final.
One of those six wins was an 8-1 annihilation in the final of the German Grand Prix and right now it just seems as though the English ace has the Green Machine’s number.
He’s a short price to win but can be turned into a more attractive proposition with a match win/most 180s double. He is averaging a maximum every 2.7 legs in this year’s competition, while Van Gerwen is going at one every 3.5 legs.
LUKE HUMPHRIES TO WIN, MOST 180s DOUBLE
Humphries To Complete Rare Double
Only two men, Phil Taylor and Van Gerwen, have held world and Premier League titles simultaneously, and now Humphries can join that exclusive list.
Humphries, crowned world champion in the first week of January, has enjoyed a stellar Premier League debut, reaching six finals with four wins.
When he’s on top of his game he is almost unstoppable and is the only player in the tournament to have gone through 16 weeks of action boasting a final average of over 100.
LUKE HUMPHRIES TO WIN PREMIER LEAGUE
