On Saturday night, as the 16-year-old darts sensation Luke “the Nuke” Littler surged to an easy win over one of the game’s greatest ever players, a TV commentator remarked: “It’s almost as if the kebab shop is closing at 10 and he’s rushing to get there on time.”
The Warrington teenager is known for celebrating wins with a takeaway and was landing repeated 180s as he swatted aside Raymond van Barneveld, who had won several world titles before Littler was even born. There was something paternal about how the older champion congratulated the rising star.
Littler now advances into a quarter-final on New Year’s Day, on track to become the sport’s youngest-ever world champion, inspiring pride but not surprise in those who have witnessed his extraordinary rise from the Cheshire county darts team to contending for a £500,000 prize at Alexandra Palace.
“Look at his eyes,” said Karl Holden, who co-founded St Helens Darts Academy, where Littler learned his craft. “He is focused when he gets to the oche. He is always thinking and working out which way to go.”
Holden described Littler as “an incredible kid” and didn’t dispute the suggestion Littler was shaping up as the Lionel Messi of darts – lasering in on the treble twenty with a single-minded drive redolent of the world’s greatest footballer tearing towards goal. “I smiled [in the last match] when he left 170 on purpose and hit treble twenty, treble twenty and bull [the highest checkout] for the game. He is up to entertain the crowd.”
The Ally Pally darts crowd can be wild – 3,000 cheering fans in varying stages of intoxication and fancy dress. The venue echoes to chants of “You’ve got school in the morning” when Littler is on the stage. But it is something Littler appears to love, egging on the fans on Saturday night.
“There are players in their 30s and 40s who still can’t cope with that stage and he can,” said Holden. “Before he was 11 we put him in the under-21s which we didn’t want to because he was only going on 11. Within weeks he was beating the under-21s.”
Last year’s world champion, Michael “Bully Boy” Smith, attended the same academy, but he was 32 when he won his first world title and his title defence ended at the weekend. Littler is the next product of a darts hotbed around St Helens.
Littler had wanted to be a footballer – as a centre back “no one was getting past me”, he said – but he quit aged 10 to concentrate on darts. As he was ferried to tournaments with the support of his dad, Anthony, a taxi driver, and his mum, Lisa Littler, a shop worker, he learned to cope with the mind games of competitive darts – slow play, fast play and noise from the crowd.
“By the time he was 13, there was nothing we could do for him because he was that good,” Holden said. “He likes a challenge. He has always wanted to play the better players and beat them. He loves showing how good he is, and he is in his element [at the world championships].”
Littler only recently left school, where he had to miss lessons to play in tournaments – such as the 2022 JDC World Darts Championship – which he invariably won.
“Whenever we rung in and said I am playing in this big tournament, or playing in this, they have gone on the register and classed it as a sporting activity,” he said.
But with school behind him, “it’s darts, darts, darts now”, Littler said. His rise has drawn comparisons to Emma Raducanu, the Bromley tennis player who won the 2021 US Open aged 18.
“It’s like all sports – football, tennis and darts – you have got youngsters coming through at 16, 17 years old … there’s young players playing for Barcelona, and in the Premier League squads,” Littler said. “Darts with me – hopefully it will get bigger and bigger.”
Last week, the Arsenal footballers Declan Rice and Aaron Ramsdale asked for pictures with Littler when they discovered he was staying in the same hotel.
Littler said: “At the Arsenal game the other day, people were getting photos with me and when I was putting my hood up, people were walking around in front of me asking for a picture and I was like: ‘What? I’ve got my hood up – I’m trying to hide.’ But it’s all good that people are wanting pictures. I’m glad.”
He has also felt the trickier side of fame after posing for the Sun newspaper holding a copy of the paper in one hand and a kebab in the other last week. The paper is widely loathed around Liverpool (Warrington is close by) after its coverage of the 1989 Hillsborough football stadium disaster. Littler later apologised after a social media backlash, saying: “I didn’t fully understand at the time what I was being asked to do.”
But in the darts arena, Littler’s maturity, belying his years, stands out. Asked whether he feels “unstoppable” as he approaches a winnable New Year’s Day clash with the 50-year-old County Fermanagh player Brendan Dolan, he replied: “I said it time and time again. Whatever Luke Littler turns up, on whatever day I play, will guarantee the outcome of the result.”
But most experts are betting on him seeking out more celebratory kebabs, and the next phase in what may be a new era of popularity for darts.
