2023 was a struggle for Peter Wright on the whole. The highlight of that campaign was undoubtedly his European Championship success in October. That victory probably cemented his place in this year’s Premier League line-up and without it you have to question whether this fans’ favourite would’ve been included otherwise.

He finished bottom of this event last year and languished in that position from week three onwards and he exited the World Championship at the first hurdle when he was emphatically beaten by Jim Williams. His seasonal average last year was down several points and it showed in his results.

His 2024 campaign kicked off in Bahrain recently and the signs suggest he still needs to improve if he’s to reach the levels we’ve become to expect of him. He defeated Haruki Muramatsu in the opening round but required a last leg decider to prevail 6-5 and was then overwhelmingly put in his place by Michael Smith 6-1 in the next round. Those question marks are enough to convince me that against the elite here another struggle beckons and he’ll suffer the same fate as last year, by finishing bottom once again.

The world no. 1 swept aside all in front of him at the end of 2023, winning the World Grand Grand Prix, Grand Slam of Darts, Players Championship Finals and, of course, the World Championship.

Being the best player in the world he does, of course, possess a power-scoring game and can bang in the maximums for fun. This was the case at the World Championship recently where he also won the Ballon d’Art. This was a new trophy introduced by the tournament sponsor Paddy Power, to be awarded to the player who hit the most 180s during the competition.

‘Cool Hand’ registered 73 in the process to win that ahead of his nearest rival Luke Littler. These two lead the market for this statistic but Humphries should have enough consistency over this long event to emerge with the most maximums, he had too much on this front in the World Championship final, hitting 23 compared to the 13 of Littler in the 48 legs they played. Michael Smith can perhaps be a threat at longer odds but hasn’t looked as prolific in this respect of late and all known recent data, Humphries is the one to side with in this market.

A lot of the talk in darts at the moment centres around Luke Littler. If it isn’t him it’s often Luke Humphries and Michael van Gerwen. This will not sit well with Gerwyn Price who to some extent is going under the radar.

He suffered a fairly early exit at the World Championship when he was surprisingly eliminated by Brendan Dolan in his second match. He didn’t play badly on that occasion, Dolan was just emphatic on his finishing, doing the right things at the right times. Of course, that was just the beginning for Dolan who also claimed the notable scalp of Gary Anderson in that event, as he went on to reach the quarter-finals and prove his victory over the Iceman was no fluke.

The Premier League, until last year, was not a happy hunting ground for the ‘Iceman’ but he topped the league phase in 2023 and did so with relative comfort. He was easily the best player for most of the event, regularly putting on mesmeric displays and posting some monstrous averages. He fell just short in the final to MVG and no doubt will want to go one better this year.

These short format games suit him too. He won four Players Championship events in 2023, more than any other player, despite playing considerably less of those events than most. This year’s event kicks off in Cardiff and the draw has given him every chance of winning on home soil. If he can kick off with an early success there, he’ll be in the mix from the off and a confident Gerwyn Price is a difficult player to dethrone.

Luke Littler has not only become a darting superstar in a short space of time, he’s quickly achieved global fame, mingling with stars and being invited to many big sporting events. There’s always a question mark how these kind of things can affect your sporting performance, but he seems to be revelling in the stardom and taking it all in his stride.

The World Championship runner-up certainly kicked off his 2024 campaign in style by winning the first tournament of the year, the Bahrain Darts Masters. He arguably faced the trickiest opponent in the opening round in Man Lok Leung, he emphatically beat Nathan Aspinall in the next round, which included him hitting a nine darter and he saw off Gerwyn Price and Michael van Gerwen with relative ease in the semi-final and final respectively.

The 17-year-old is a generational talent and kicks off against tournament favourite Luke Humphries in a rematch of their World Championship final. His victory over MVG would certainly have given Littler a big boost and revenge against Humphries would be another. He doesn’t lack confidence anyway but defeating those calibre of players can only supercharge his ego further.

Littler is a winning machine and that victory in Bahrain, against the same seven opponents he’s going to face week in, week out in this year’s Premier League indicates what we already thought we knew, that he’s ready for this. His explosive bursts in short format matches can win him matches in the blink of an eye and we’d be surprised if he doesn’t feature on finals night to give him a chance of winning one of the biggest events in the darting calendar, and increase his rapidly growing fame even further.

MVG is the most decorated player in Premier League history having won the event seven times, one more than the great Phil Taylor.

He comes into this year’s event as reigning champion having won the event the last two years. Whilst he didn’t win the title in the same fashion he did so during the four times in his pomp between 2016 and 2019, he still managed to win the event.

In 2022 he survived a match dart against Joe Cullen to lift the trophy and last year despite playing second fiddle to Gerwyn Price for much of the event, he beat the ‘Iceman’ comfortably in the final, 11-5.

Whilst he will be disappointed with his surprise exit at the World Championship to Scott Williams in the quarter-finals, he was a strong tournament favourite when he departed and showed he’s suffering no hangover from this by reaching the final of the Bahrain Darts Masters, losing out to Luke Littler.

‘Mighty Mike’ will want to put a marker down and win this event for an eighth time, and let Luke Humphries and Luke Littler et al know he’s still the man to beat. He doesn’t come into this event as tournament favourite, but his odds do represent value.