The strangest quarter-final line-up in recent history?

It’s quarter-final night and there are a few men who have been hastily extending their hotel stays and changing their flights home as they prepare for games that in all honesty they wouldn’t have been expecting to be a part of.

As much as Phil Taylor, James Wade and possibly Mark Webster would have made plans for a stay to at least this stage, the rest of the final eight will have had to disappoint their wives and kids with the news that the business trip has gone on longer than expected.

The first contest of the evening sees Brendan Dolan taking on John Henderson in an extremely tight contest that the bookies have the big Scot as the slight favourite for.  One thing that nearly cost the Highlander against Wes Newton in the last round were his starting doubles, and that could cost him tonight potentially.  I think it is going to be an extremely close one and could well go to a full seven sets.  With both being so inexperienced at this stage of tournaments, but with possible advantage from the crowd, I’m going to go for a narrow win for Dolan.

Although James Wade has quite rightly been made favourite for his clash with Andy Smith it is going to be no walkover for the Machine, and he is going to have to dig as deep as he did against Vincent van der Voort to progress to the semis.  The Pie Man is playing as well as he has at any point in his career and will be a real threat to Wade, but despite this, the left-hander is getting back to his very best and that should be too much for his opponent tonight.

The man most cursing his luck in the quarter-final draw will be Mark Webster who would be hot favourite in a couple of the other ties, but will be anything but against Phil Taylor.  Even though the Welshman famously saw off Taylor in the last World Championships at the quarter-final stage, he hasn’t repeated this success since and the way the Power has been playing there are few who could really challenge him.  Webster continues to impress, and quite rightly keeps his place in the top eight in the world, but I can’t see him winning this one.

Finally, another really tight one that could easily go either way between surprise packages Mark Hylton and Richie Burnett.  Mile High is the favourite for the contest, but the momentum of Burnett seems to be unstoppable at the moment making it incredibly close to call.  A month ago there would have been no question that I would have backed Hylton, but the Prince of Wales has really turned things around and I am backing him to continue the incredible run all the way to the semi-finals.