Luke Littler was relaxing with his family in between bursts of practice in the bowels of Alexandra Palace when he started feeling hungry. It was just a couple of hours before the start of the World Darts Championship final, and the reigning champion realised he hadn’t eaten anything all day.
He ordered a margherita pizza, “scranned that”, in his own words, and then went out and defended his world title.
After he had dispatched Gian van Veen 7-1, “hunger” was the buzzword. He is 18 years old and the owner of two world titles, so naturally he was asked if he might one day take down Phil Taylor’s record tally of 16.
“It’s so far away, 14 to go – another 15, 16 years, I’d say,” he smiled, only half joking.
“I’ll be around for a very long time and I’m here to win. Being so young and already picking up two of these – who knows if I could reach it. If I get five or six (world titles), I’ll be happy. I think I could if I stay around for long enough, keep the hunger… Once the hunger goes, there’s no point playing. But there’s a lot of hunger left inside of me.”
What was so telling was that Littler’s conditions for eclipsing Taylor were dependent not on his ability on the oche, or his opponents’ talents, but simply on the extent of his appetite. Perhaps his greatest challenge is not Luke Humphries after all. Nor is it Van Veen, Josh Rock or any of the game’s rising stars. Littler’s success will come down to how much his own legacy matters to him.
There are clear similarities with Tiger Woods, who won his first major at 21 and was someone with a prodigious talent so obviously beyond anyone else on tour, old or young, that thoughts quickly turned to whether he could outdo Jack Nicklaus’s haul of 18. Woods had memorable battles with Jim Furyk and Phil Mickelson, yet ultimately it was not rivals but injury and his own personal demons that scuppered his chase. Woods is the most talented golfer ever to swing a club, but Nicklaus’s record remains untouched.
Time will tell how Littler copes with his very public ascent into adulthood, but the early signs show a young man bedded in normality. His entourage is largely made up of family. He still goes to Manchester United games with his hometown mates. His goading of fans over prize money after the fourth round was ill-advised, but he is first and foremost a darts obsessive and money doesn’t appear to be a distraction. Asked how he would spend his £1m prize, he couldn’t come up with much of an answer. “I can’t buy a new car with it, I am going to have to get a year on the insurance before changing that one.”
Woods held his place at world No 1 for 281 consecutive weeks, sitting on golf’s throne for more than five years. It pips Roger Federer’s stint of 237 weeks early in his career. Littler could now do something similar after widening his gap at the top of the world rankings, which is calculated by prize money over the past two years. Littler has earned £2.8m in a period that includes his two world titles, while Humphries, his closest rival, earned £1.1m. Van Veen is the only other player with more than £700,000 in prize money.
In the haze after this world final, it is hard to imagine how Littler is toppled. He can be beaten, of course, and Van Veen has shown that better than most with three victories over Littler in the past 12 months. But when it comes to the biggest stage, the richest prizes and the longest, most testing formats of darts, Littler’s talent and mentality both come to the fore. He has now played 15 major finals and lost only four times, one of which was as a 16-year-old in his first World Championship.
Littler’s gift is to suck opponents into his orbit and send them into a spin. Van Veen averaged 105 against Humphries in his dominant quarter-final and was sensational in taking down Gary Anderson in the semis. His numbers across the tournament were largely comparable with Littler’s before the final, which is why plenty of very knowledgeable onlookers tipped Van Veen not just to compete but to win the match.
But in the final, in a best-of-13 setting, none of that mattered. Van Veen won the first set and almost stole the second, but as soon as Littler wrestled the momentum away, he ascended to a level so unfathomably high that the Dutchman could not afford to miss a dart, like a light being shined in his eyes as he played. “Luke Humphries and Gary Anderson, the players they are, they always put you under pressure,” Van Veen said. “But Luke Littler is different pressure.”
There are chinks in the armour – Littler averaged a slightly more human 97 in the second round, and a stronger opponent than David Davies might have wobbled the world No 1. But that was an exception, not the norm. He raised his game at the sharp end of the tournament, at will, and no one could live with him. So perhaps it all comes down to hunger. How many world titles does Littler want to scran? He insists he is still ravenous.
