Fast Results

Scores

Racecards

Rob Cross (Picture: PDC)

Grand Slam of Darts 2024: Day seven predictions, betting tips, acca, order of play and TV time

By Chris Hammer

Darts

Fri November 15, 2024 · 1M ago

The 2024 Grand Slam of Darts continues on Friday night with two quarter-finals so check out Chris Hammer's match-by-match predictions, best bets and a suggested acca.

Darts betting tips: Grand Slam of Darts day seven

2pts Rob Cross to win the Grand Slam of Darts at 11/2 (General)

SL Acca: 1pt Menzies -1.5 legs and -1.5 180s v Mansell & Cross -2.5 legs & -1.5 180s v Lukeman at 11/2 with Sky Bet

Sky Bet odds | Paddy Power | Betfair Sportsbook

Evening Session (1900 GMT)

TV Coverage: Sky Sports
Format: Quarter-Finals, best of 31 legs

Cameron Menzies (4/9) v Mickey Mansell (13/8)

Tournament Ave: 93.19 - 98.32
Tournament 180s per leg: 0.32 - 0.21
Tournament Checkout %: 35.09% - 63.64%

What an incredible opportunity this is for both players to make a huge career breakthrough.

They've already gone further than ever before in a PDC major but that probably won't be much consolation to the loser, who will head home feeling they could have missed out on something truly special.

At least for Cameron Menzies, he'd have proved to himself that he does belong on the biggest stages and will probably have plenty more major quarter-finals and title challenges in the future.

The popular Scotsman was so dejected after his World Grand Prix defeat last month that he tweeted to say he was 'so far off being a pro' but he subsequently reduced his hours at work before winning his maiden PDC title at a Players Championship event.

Menzies looked as though he'd blown his chances to progress through the groups when suffering a 5-1 defeat to already-eliminated Beau Greaves in his final match only for Danny Noppert to do him a skin-saving favour against Martin Schindler.

CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO RECEIVE THE OFFER

While Menzies made the most of his reprieve with a dramatic 10-9 victory over James Wade, the man who helped him get that far suffered an unexpected defeat to another surprise package in Mickey Mansell.

Unlike Menzies, this could well be a one-off venture to the latter stages of a major for the 51-year-old journeyman.

He'd already exceeded everyone's exceptions on his Grand Slam debut by getting through a group stage including Luke Humphries and was also underdog to overcome Danny Noppert in the previous round.

To say this run has come out of the blue is an understatement. Not only has he never enjoyed a lengthy major run but this season has been one of his worst - losing 16 first round matches of the 30 Players Championship he's entered and never reaching the quarter-finals of any of them.

His Pro Tour results have been so poor he failed to qualify for the Players Championship Finals.

But then he turns up at a Grand Slam of Darts qualifier, beats Gerwyn Price in his 'final' and goes on to enjoy a dream run that has seen him average almost 100 for the tournament so far.

His scoring may not be the heaviest but his finishing has been lethal - which can't be said of Menzies.

There is a gulf in tournament average but when you look at the season as a whole, Menzies is over 96 while Mansell is down at 92 while the Scotsman also has a Players Championship title to his name. He's a very fair favourite.

Neither have recent regular experience of long format matches apart from their outings at the World Championship but Menzies does have more historical experience when you take into account his WDF days.

I'm going for Menzies to come through and also comfortably win the 180s battle.

Verdict: 16-12

Click here to bet on Menzies v Mansell with Sky Bet

Martin Lukeman (21/10) v Rob Cross (4/9)

Tournament Ave: 94.01 - 96.90
Tournament 180s per leg: 0.28 - 0.26
Tournament Checkout %: 47.17% - 67.65%

Not only is Rob Cross the only player in this section of the draw with any experience of long format matches in the PDC - he's won a hell of a lot of them en route to major finals and titles.

Last year's runner-up, who has also reached three major quarter-finals in 2024 since a semi-final run at the World Championship, hasn't needed to play to his best to get this far and probably won't be pushed to those levels tonight either.

That's taking absolutely nothing away from Martin Lukeman, who is enjoying the deserved highs of a career-best major run, but the underdog isn't here because he's been playing unbeatable darts from the gods - it's because he's produced a nice level of consistency in the mid-90s and punished faulty performances.

One of those was against Cross, who led 3-0 in the group stages yet somehow imploded and lost 5-3 despite averaging over 10 points higher with 98.5.

If that was a best-of-31 legs encounter, the expectation would have been for Cross to recover from an early blip and find the levels necessary to power to a commanding victory.

Lukeman has no experience of longer format under the pressure of this level and that should be a decisive factor despite his recent averages not being too far off what Voltage is attaining.

While the secret to Cross' success so far has been on the outer ring having pinned almost 68% of his doubles so far - including 10 out of 12 attempts against Ritchie Edhouse - I feel he'll also have too much firepower in the 180s department.

Lukeman does boast the slightly higher 180 per leg rate this week but over the season, Cross is at 0.24 compared to the underdog's 0.18 and I feel Voltage is warming up and is more likely to maintain his rhythm and range as the match progresses.

Verdict: 11-16

Click here to bet on Lukeman v Cross with Sky Bet

TITLE TIP

As previously mentioned, Rob Cross is the most likely to play to get himself into the final from the top half of the draw given his wealth of experience of playing - and winner - longer format matches on the biggest PDC stages.

Even when it comes to seasonal form, there's nobody playing significantly better than him to render past successes meaningless.

He knows how to pace himself over long distances, how to turn the screw as a front runner and also how not to panic when facing big deficits - as we so saw so memorably against Chris Dobey at the World Championship back in January.

If he does reach the final then he'll be underdog against either Luke Littler or Gary Anderson - and potentially Gian van Veen if the young Dutchman maintains his frightening levels of form during the longer format - but he will have one notable advantage over any of them. A day of rest on Saturday.

The finalist from the bottom half will need to play a best-of-31 leg match on Saturday night and then another on Sunday afternoon before recovering for the Sunday night climax.

You'd like to think Cross' journey to the final would be smoother and allow him to have more energy in the tank when the trophy is on the line, whereas anyone from the bottom half could quite easily be embroiled in a gruelling semi-final of the ages.