Premier League Darts: Night 12 predictions, betting tips, accas, Sunday order of play & TV time

• Follow @ChrisHammer180 on Twitter
• Premier League tournament guide

We've been treated to five weeks worth of Premier League drama since Tuesday and after tonight's sixth successive round of fixtures is over, we'll only have three days to wait until the players return to Milton Keynes for one last run to conclude the regular season.

As tight as the table is, these results of these matches could be pivotal in the race for the top four...

Premier League Night 12: August 30

Click on the odds for more Sky Bet match markets

• TV Coverage: Sky Sports (1900 BST)
• Format: Maximum of 14 legs
• Suggested Acca: Aspinall, Price & Smith at 20/1
• 'Win or draw' acca: Aspinall, Price, Smith & Durrant at 5.6/1

Nathan Aspinall (5/4) v Gary Anderson (6/4), draw (3/1)

• Head-to-head: 3-1, 1 draw (TV: 1-0, 1 draw)
• Meetings since start of 2019: 1-0, 1 draw (TV: 1-0, 1 draw)
• Last Meeting: 6-5 (Home Tour, June 2020)
• Individual Career PDC Titles: 6-46 (TV: 2-14)
• PDC Titles this season: 3-1 (TV: 0-0)

Gary Anderson will still be spitting feathers about how he failed to close out victory over Glen Durrant last night having led 7-3 and then spurning six darts at a double at 7-4 up.

The Flying Scotsman missed another in the penultimate leg which means he has to settle with being joint second with Nathan Aspinall on 13 points and four behind the runaway leader, instead of being his nearest challenger and just two adrift.

It's not ideal preparation to take on the Asp, who came from 5-1 down against him in their previous Premier League encounter back in March to earn what could end up being a priceless point in the intensely close race for the top four.

That night in Liverpool showcased the star quality of Aspinall's game but this week it's been more about the heart and character, having picked up three hard-fought victories out of five against Gerwyn Price and Michael Smith (twice) to give him real hope of making the play-offs on debut just like Durrant.

Anderson has consistently been up and down this week - as we've grown to expect in recent times - and I can see him being dragged into another compelling duel that possibly goes the very distance once again.

Aspinall shows no fear to anyone and of course beat the two-time world champion in an absorbing World Championship clash back in December, so I'll give him the slight edge in this one as well as throwing in some 'Player Performance' extras I feel are pretty tame for him.

Prediction: 8-6

Suggested bet: Nathan Aspinall to win the match, score over 3.5 180s and checkout over 84.5 at 7/2

Peter Wright (1/1) v Gerwyn Price (15/8), draw (3/1)

• Head-to-head: 16-6, 1 draw (TV: 6-5, 1 draw)
• Meetings since start of 2019: 4-4 (TV: 3-3)
• Last Meeting: 7-3 (Premier League, February 2020)
• Individual Career PDC Titles: 30-11 (TV: 6-2)
• PDC Titles this season: 3-2 (TV: 1-0)

At the start of the season, most of us would have expected Peter Wright and Gerwyn Price to be vying for top spot in the table with Michael van Gerwen after 11 games and adding more heat to the debate of 'who is best player in the world right now'.

As it's turned out, all three of them are now under the same intense pressure just to qualify for the play-offs and thoughts of trying to catch runaway leader Glen Durrant are fading by the night.

Of course there's still time for all that to change and they could still all cram into the top four by next Saturday night to restore order - but it certainly won't be a cruise.

Price headed into the restart with lingering fears over an early elimination - which were only ended mathematically as recently as Judgement Night - but victory over Wright will see him leapfrog the world champion by a point and ensure that he finally ends an evening in the top four.

Wright's showed no fear during the World Championship final and although he's lost their last three meetings, he'll sense this is a perfect time to be playing MVG as he looks to bounce back from a defeat to Daryl Gurney that defied statistics and his nine-darter.

The two-time Grand Slam of Darts kind is seemingly fulfilling his pledge to improve with regular top-class action and his third ever victory over van Gerwen, which was achieved more comfortably than either of his other two, was further evidence of this and will give him a renewed skip in his step.

Wright comes into this clash still wondering how Daryl Gurney managed to defy statistics and his nine-darter to pull off a shock victory last night that really has put him in a precarious position.

He may have a strong head-to-head record over the Welshman, including a heavy World Championship semi-final victory and a pair of Players Championship final wins this year, but he was battered 7-1 in their last Premier League meeting back in February.

The Iceman also dismantled him 16-6 in last year's Grand Slam of Darts final so nobody will be surprised whichever this match swings. I just feel, overall, that Price is the value call at 15/8.

Prediction: 5-8

Suggested bet: Gerwyn Price to win the match, score over 2.5 180s and checkout over 81.5 at 3/1

Michael van Gerwen (4/5) v Michael Smith (9/4), draw (7/2)

• Head-to-head: 30-9 (TV: 11-3)
• Meetings since start of 2019: 5-3 (TV: 4-2)
• Last Meeting: 7-4 (Premier League, March 2020)
• Individual Career PDC Titles: 131-10 (TV: 51-1)
• PDC Titles this season: 3-0 (TV: 1-0)

Michael van Gerwen finds himself in uncharted waters.

Not only is the five-time champion's 100% record of always topping the Premier League table highly likely to end, but he's facing a very real battle just to make the top four.

Three defeats out of five this week means he's now lost five of his 11 games overall so far and lies fourth in the table with a legs difference of just +4.

When you bare in mind he's topped the table in all of his previous seven seasons, never lost more than four in any of them, and has ended the campaigns with a legs difference of anything between +27 and +43, this current situation he finds himself in is pretty alarming to say the least.

MVG's averages this week have been 103.37 (7-2 v Cross), 98.18 (3-7 v Durrant), 95.21 (4-7 v Anderson), 95.33 (8-6 v Aspinall) and 99.19 (4-8 v Price) so he's hardly been throwing badly - just not to the astoundingly high levels that always seemed such a certainty.

None of the elite ever seem to freeze against him anymore, with Gerwyn Price able to close out a commanding position relatively comfortably for his third ever win over him last night instead of buckling like on numerous occasions in the past.

The whole 'beware the wounded animal' argument has to go out of the window too given the Dutchman's number of defeats this week and Michael Smith must go into this believing this is the ideal time to face him.

Bully Boy was the second player to beat him this season in Exeter - just seven days after his maiden televised nine-darter - but he too needs to raise his game over the remaining five fixtures if he's to force his way into the top four.

The St Helens man has blown very hot with his 180s this week with 30 from five games to take his season tally to an astonishing 47 but despite finally getting his checkout percentage above 40s for the first time since the restart against Nathan Aspinall, he somehow let the Stockport man off the hook for 25 missed darts at doubles in an 8-6 defeat.

Fortunately for Smith he's only two points adrift of the top four and three behind the joint second duo of Aspinall and Anderson - so he's far from out of it as long as he's fired up and not showing signs of frustration about how his week has gone worse than he'd hoped.

Prediction: 8-6

Suggested bet: Smith to win and hit most 180s at 4/1

Glen Durrant (4/5) v Daryl Gurney (9/4), draw (7/2)

• Head-to-head: 3-2 (TV: 1-1)
• Meetings since start of 2019: 3-2 (TV: 2-1)
• Last Meeting: 7-5 (Premier League, March 2020)
• Individual Career PDC Titles: 2-5 (TV: 0-2)
• PDC Titles this season: 0-0 (TV: 0-0)

Only Phil Taylor and Michael van Gerwen know what it's like to be as far ahead as Glen Durrant is at this stage of a Premier League season, and few others have felt this assured of a top-four place with five rounds of fixtures remaining.

Obviously he's not mathematically safe yet, but it's hard to see how four players can realistically overtake him now considering he's four points clear of the chasing pack.

An unbeaten week so far included three fine wins over Michael van Gerwen, Rob Cross and Gerwyn Price sandwiched between two somewhat fortuitous draws against Peter Wright and Gary Anderson.

The World Cup team-mates only had themselves to blame however, with Wright miscounting in the deciding leg and Anderson blowing a 7-3 lead and spurning seven match darts, including six in one leg when 7-4 up.

It summed up Durrant's incredible week that he could be in such a perilous position against the Flying Scotsman yet still end the evening with the same four-point cushion that he started with.

Credit must go to him for making the most of his chances while his never say die attitude piled the pressure on Anderson during the closing stages.The ever-gracious Teessider was quick to brand his point lucky and somewhat embarrassing but he still averaged higher with 97 and fired in three 100+ checkouts, including a superb 136.

There will be no complacency from such a mentally strong competitor as Durrant - even when he's finally an odds-on favourite to win a match - that's not to say there's no vulnerabilities when he comes up against Daryl Gurney.

The way 2020 has gone, would it actually be that weird to see Gurney qualify for the play-offs?!

A night after the relative joys of avoiding elimination on Judgement Night, the Northern Irishman's race looked run once again when a tame defeat to Michael Smith left him rock bottom of the new table and a whopping six adrift of the top four.

Now that gap is down to just four after he stunned nine-dart hero Peter Wright with an 8-6 victory that doesn't make sense if you only looked at the stats.

He averaged almost eight points less than Snakebite with 95, threw eight fewer 180s with just one while his checkout percentage of 47% wasn't that much higher than Wright's 43%.

But a 164 checkout helped put him 4-0 up and from there he just did enough to keep the world champion at arm's length, including a superb 141 finish to complete a 12-darter in leg 10.

This is Gurney to a tee but it's hard to produce these kind of performances on a regular basis, which is ultimately why he doesn't reel in as many titles as the other elite players.

This has all the makings of a gruelling hard-fought encounter but I'm going for the unconventional double of Duzza to win but Gurney to hit most 180s at 5/1. SuperChin has hit four fewer this week with nine - albeit having played two fewer legs - but has six more overall for the season.

Prediction: 8-6

Suggested bet: Durrant to win and Gurney hit most 180s at 5/1

2020 Premier League Darts Table

1. Durrant P 11 W 7 D 3 L 1 LegD +22 Pts 17
2. Aspinall P 11 W 6 D 1 L 4 LegD +5 Pts 13
3. Anderson P 11 W 5 D 3 L 3 LegD +3 Pts 13
4. Van Gerwen P 11 W 6 D 0 L 5 LegD +4 Pts 12
5. Wright P 11 W 5 D 2 L 4 LegD +5 Pts 12
6. Price P 11 W 4 D 3 L 4 LegD +10 Pts 11
7. Smith P 11 W 5 D 1 L 5 LegD +5 Pts 11
8. Gurney P 11 W 3 D 2 L 6 LegD -11 Pts 8
9. Cross P 9 W 1 D 3 L 5 LegD -14 Pts 5* ELIMINATED AT JUDGEMENT NIGHT

Remaining fixtures and dates

Night 13 - Wednesday September 2
Marshall Arena, Milton Keynes
TV Channel: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)

• Glen Durrant v Michael Smith
• Daryl Gurney v Gary Anderson
• Peter Wright v Michael van Gerwen
• Gerwyn Price v Nathan Aspinall

Night 14 - Thursday September 3
Marshall Arena, Milton Keynes
TV Channel: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)

• Gerwyn Price v Daryl Gurney
• Gary Anderson v Michael Smith
• Peter Wright v Nathan Aspinall
• Glen Durrant v Michael van Gerwen

Night 15 - Friday September 4
Marshall Arena, Milton Keynes
TV Channel: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)

• Daryl Gurney v Nathan Aspinall
• Glen Durrant v Peter Wright
• Gary Anderson v Michael van Gerwen
• Michael Smith v Gerwyn Price

Night 16 Saturday September 5
Marshall Arena, Milton Keynes
TV Channel: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)

• Peter Wright v Michael Smith
• Michael van Gerwen v Daryl Gurney
• Nathan Aspinall v Glen Durrant
• Gerwyn Price v Gary Anderson

Play-Offs - Thursday October 22
The O2, London TV
Channel: Sky Sports (1900 GMT)

Semi-Finals (Best of 19 legs)

• First v Fourth
• Second v Third

Finals (Best of 21 legs)

• Winner SF 1 v Winner SF 2

Related Darts Content

• 2020 Premier League venues & dates
• 2020 PDC event calendar & results
• 2020 World Darts Championship results
• 2019 PDC event results
• Sky Bet's darts odds