Peter Wright and Stephen Bunting will get the evening session underway at the Ally Pally on New Year’s Day. ‘Snakebite’ rolled back the years to dethrone Luke Humphries in the round of 16, while ‘The Bullet’ breezed through to the quarter-final stage with a 4-0 whitewash of Luke Woodhouse.

Wright’s sensational showing against Humphries served as a timely reminder that he has what it takes to become a three-time world champion. In fact, that was the Scotsman’s most impressive display on the world stage since lifting the trophy three years ago – he averaged north of 100 and converted 70% of his doubles.

Meanwhile, Bunting has made a near flawless run to reach this stage, winning each of his three matches, losing just two of the overall 13 sets that he has contested thus far. He also racked up an average in excess of 100 when seeing off Madars Razma in round three.

Both arrowsmiths are in fine fettle and will be going hammer and tongs to win this one, so this has all the ingredients to be a classic encounter. As such, over 7.5 sets holds plenty of appeal in a game that could go the distance.

Luke Littler is expected to come through his quarter-final tie with Nathan Aspinall on New Year’s Day but it might not be the cakewalk the pre-match odds suggest. It hasn’t all been straightforward for ‘The Nuke’ en-route to the last-eight. He was slow out of the blocks against both Ryan Meikle and Ian White before surviving a huge scare against Ryan Joyce to reach this stage.

Littler remains the rightful favourite to lift the trophy but he is not bulletproof either, as we saw in each of his previous three outings. With that in mind, the teenage sensation looks worth opposing to overcome a steep handicap hurdle here.

While ‘The Asp’ has been solid rather than spectacular in plotting his own path to the quarter-final stage, he represents an awkward proposition for Littler. The Stockport star seems to thrive on the underdog tag and clearly enjoys playing on the Ally Pally stage.

What’s more, Aspinall is one of the most dogged and determined characters on the PDC circuit, and will certainly be no pushover. He is more than capable of taking at least a couple of sets here and therefore warrants support with a +3.5 start on the handicap.