Benidorm

This isn't a post about either my mother or my deputy managers impending holiday destination, or indeed the ITV sitcom of the same name. This weekend in Benidorm sees the beginning of a brand new year of PDC darts, and a good opportunity for the "new signings" to lay down an early marker.

I was hoping to do a rundown of some of the new PDC players and pick out one or two juicy bets to last the year such as "Player X to win a Players Championship event in 2012". I'm sure that at least one firm priced this up last year, but the lack of markets is both surprising and disappointing.

The PDC is getting bigger and better every year, TV ratings beat everything except Soccerball, but unless there's a major championship on it's as if the sport doesn't exist. If John Henderson was playing Barrie Bates in a Sky tournament, there would be about fifty different markets ranging from the colour of the first double hit, to whether Bates could average over 79.5 or not. But if Gary Anderson plays James Wade this weekend, the best we can hope for is a tweet from one of the players in attendance telling us who won.

Fear not though darts betting fans, the World Cup is live on Sky next weekend, and no doubt Uncle Phil has had the format changed to prevent any embarrassments like last year. But it's going to be a great year for darts both on and off TV, and there are enough of the players tweeting these days to make sure we're kept abreast of current form etc. A couple of lines on the prospects of some of the more interesting new additions:

Ted Hankey: The misspelled Count seems to be very underrated as a darts player. The trend of the modern era is to judge a player on their averages but that isn't always the be all and end all. Hankey is a two time World Champion (and could possibly have become three time if he had wanted to recently), and has the knack of knocking ten points off his opponents average.

I genuinely feel that Ted would do fairly well in the televised majors, but you don't get handed tickets into them anymore, and he's going to have to perform to a consistent level in the Players Championships for the next two years to become a regular on TV. Whether he can do that is the big question.

Dean Winstanley: Former Lakeside runner-up, Winstanley proved he can mix it with the very best with some decent performances in the Grand Slam. I don't expect it to take him too long to make the TV events, as he should start getting some decent floor results quickly. I don't think he's good enough yet to be talked about as a top ten or even top sixteen player though. His counting is abysmal and he misses too many pressure doubles.

The West Brothers: No comment as I enjoy having my kneecaps exactly where they are.

Stuart Kellett: Kellett burst onto the darting scene by reaching the televised stages of the 2007 World Masters, but it was his great year in 2010 that made it look like we had the next big superstar on our hands. He was the strong 16/1 tip of this blog to win the 2011 Lakeside Title, and after thrashing Daryl Fitton 3-0 with a great average, those odds were suddenly cut by three quarters. Unfortunately he then swaggered onto the stage for his next match, high on over-confidence or god knows what, and tamely lost to Mr.Coat with a 79 average.

At 30 years of age he has time on his side, and won his tour card easily enough, but will this precocious talent thrive in the PDC, or will his haphazard attitude hold him back? The fact that he hasn't arranged any sponsorship in time to even make the trip to Benidorm this weekend is not a good early sign, but he's the sort of lad who could do us a few favours at nice prices if he ever gets the chance.