All roads lead to the Circus Tavern in Purfleet when the totesport.com Players’ Championship gets underway on Thursday (Phil Taylor 4/11 favourite Outright – ‘Money Back Special’).

Phil Taylor, who won his 15th world title at Alexandra Palace recently, will lock horns with old adversary Peter Manley (Taylor 1/33 Manley 10/1 – match betting) in a round one blockbuster which conjures up memories of World Championship finals from yesteryear.

‘The Power’ has defeated ‘One Dart’ Manley three times at the Essex venue and the pair will do battle in one of eight first round matches on the opening night of the £250,000 tournament, which Taylor won in 2009 in its inaugural year.

Robert Thornton, who was runner-up to Taylor in last year’s tournament, will take on Kevin Painter in another high-profile first round contest,, while number two seed Mark Walsh will ttake on Steve Hine.

ITV will broadcast the totesport.com 2010 Players’ Championship Finals and PDC chairman Barry Hearn said: “We are absolutely delighted to again have ITV4 as broadcaster for this prestigious event

“The first Players’ Championship Finals earlier this year were a huge success and anticipation is already high for next year’s tournament.”

totesport.com Players’ Championship – first-round draw:

Phil Taylor (1) v Peter Manley (32)
Mark Walsh (2) v Steve Hine (31)
Colin Osborne (3) v Co Stompe (30)
Adrian Lewis (4) v Brendan Dolan (29)
Steve Beaton (5) v Tony Eccles (28)
Wes Newton (6) v Peter Wright (27)
Gary Anderson (7) v Jelle Klaasen (26)
Colin Lloyd (8) v Denis Ovens (25)
Robert Thornton (9) v Kevin Painter (24)
James Wade (10) v Mervyn King (23)
Ronnie Baxter (11) v Mark Dudbridge (22)
Dennis Priestley (12) v Paul Nicholson (21)
Alan Tabern (13) v Andy Hamilton (20)
Jamie Caven (14) v Michael van Gerwen (19)
Wayne Jones (15) v Andy Smith (18)
Terry Jenkins (16) v Vincent van der Voort (17)

9-dart moneyback! If any players makes a 9-dart finish in the totesport.com Players’ Championship, totesport will refund all losing outright bets.