It’s less than a month since his World Championship final defeat, but this feels like a different Luke Littler. Sharper haircut, new sponsors, more weathered demeanour. He already seems too old for this shit, and it’s only just begun.
Littler is about to embark on his maiden Premier League campaign, an invitation-only tournament across 17 nights, contested by eight of the world’s best players. Since his first match at Alexandra Palace Palace, he’s already beaten five of the world’s top eight players, including three en route to becoming the youngest person to win a senior PDC title at the Bahrain Masters. He hit the second nine-darter in World Series history in his quarter-final win over Nathan Aspinall, in just his tenth leg as a full-time pro.
Littler has lost just one of his eight games since the World Championship – a Dutch Masters final defeat to Michael van Gerwen, who he beat in Manama. Even then, he averaged 106.71, the highest losing average in a television final since 2017.
And now he’s at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium, the main event in town just three days before Wales’ Six Nations opener here. No questions about kebabs, we’re told. He’s moving away from kebabs.
He said recently he didn’t have one for two weeks after his first one at the World Championship. When he first espoused his affinity for doner meat, he perhaps didn’t realise quite how intricately it would become interlinked with brand Littler. There’s more to him than just kebabs.
One of the first things you notice is a change of sponsors on his garish purple top. Rochdale’s Prestige Building Supplies are out, Boohoo Man, part of billion-dollar fast-fashion brand Boohoo, are in.
Skoda Warrington are still there, but you get the sense that may not be for long when he’s asked whether he’s sampled their wares since turning 17: “I think I will buy my own car. No offence to Skoda.”
His shoes and upper back are still available for sponsorship, if you’re interested. Even at 17, he’s still too young to advertise Premier League sponsors BetMGM, who let him choose a sponsor of his own.
He selected the Motor Neurone Disease (MND) association, explaining: “It’s for Rob Burrow, the former Leeds rugby league player. I haven’t met him but I know what he’s going through for the past many years. I am from Warrington.
“I know what he’s been through. I have seen clips of how good he was. It was my choice of charity.”
Littler claims his biggest purchase with his £200,000 World Championship purse was in-game points for EAFC, the Fifa successor, with his best “pack” Thierry Henry. There’s an unmissably shiny gold watch on his wrist which suggests he may not be telling the whole truth.
But you can tell the sheer weight of it all is affecting Littler. His highlight of the past month? “Chilling. When I do get a day off, I just use it. That is what I want to do. Sleep, a lot.”
He claims he doesn’t practice in between tournaments, just using the two World Series events as warm-up for the Premier League.
And that’s no surprise. Littler has been pulled from pillar to post and back again, a content-creating leviathan wanted by everyone. There are now Luke Littler Valentine’s Day cards and a signature “Luke Wrap” at his local kebab house. His personalised darts sold out in under 20 minutes and he signed 1,050 EAFC posters with his face on at the Dutch Masters.
Manchester United have toured Littler round the players and had him at games, where he was pictured with Sir Alex Ferguson in a knitted sweater and chinos some way from his familiar Under Armour tracksuits. He even played darts against Harry Maguire and Christian Eriksen, hitting 180 to beat both three darts into a nine-dart challenge.
But you also see what United are getting out of this – the Instagram post of him and Sir Alex got 763,000 likes. Littler himself has 1.1m followers, more than twice the second-highest dartist in Van Gerwen. Like any 16-year-old, he loved providing updates on his following throughout the World Championship, but he’s already falling victim to it. Everyone from Warrington Wolves to YouTuber boxing have already had the same idea.
And ask not just what darts has done for Littler, but what Littler has done for darts. Since the World Championship, the sport’s popularity has continued to soar. Darts clubs are rammed, as are their academies.
Viagogo have said they’ve had a 204 per cent increase in ticket sales for the Premier League compared to last year. Nearly five million people watched the final at Ally Pally.
The players feel it too. Michael Smith thanked Littler for boosting the sport’s revenue on his kids’ behalf. Peter Wright said Littler has inspired him to get rid of his old darts and trophies, to start with a fresh passion for the game. Van Gerwen, in his inimitably ungrateful manner, said: “Welcome to the big boys.”
Littler’s reply? “Surely, I am one of them now! I have joined them in the big boys league.”
His accession to the Premier League is one of a thousand changes in Littler’s life, but he remains adamant he is still the same man: “This is what I am, I am just myself. This is how I have been for many years.
“I will continue being myself. I don’t need to get anything big about myself. I will just stay level-headed.”
But that isn’t true, and it can’t be true. He wouldn’t be human if it were. He now signs his name “the Nuke”, a sign his darting persona is already starting to infringe on his own.
After returning home after the World Championship, his family were so hounded by the press that they escaped for a week’s holiday in a house on a hill in the Welsh countryside. His heroes at United and Warrington now want photos with him. He recently celebrated only being spotted by three people when out for a Chinese in St Helens for his 17th birthday.
His relationship with 21-year-old Eloise Milburn has been heavily scrutinised too, with Littler having to defend it shortly after the Worlds after six weeks of dating, at 16 years old. More than 3,000 people watched the two play EAFC together on TikTok earlier this week. Everything she now posts on social media becomes a tabloid article.
World champion Luke Humphries has said the senior pros should all put an arm around Littler, protect him from the big bad world.
But Wright and Van Gerwen disagreed, as did the man himself: “I don’t really want any advice off any of these players, I know they have been there and done it.
“But for some reason, if I do start struggling then I will speak to my mum and dad, see who they can speak to – maybe a sports psychology guy.
“I just keep myself to myself, do my practice routines and if it doesn’t start working out, then something will have to change.”
Littler’s first match in Cardiff is against Humphries, who he beat in the Netherlands last week, recovering from a 4-2 leg deficit to win 6-5. A potential semi-final could bring his third match against Van Gerwen in as many weeks.
Premature entry into the Premier League has broken players before, but there is currently nothing to suggest Littler will be next. At this rate, everything away from the oche is much more of a worry.
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