At just 17 years old, Luke Littler is one of the faces in darts. PDC President Barry Hearn believes the Englishman can achieve great things in the future, but does not expect him to dominate like Phil Taylor once did.
“Phil Taylor’s title run is probably untouchable,” Hearn said in an interview with “Sky Sports” about the 16-time darts world champion, explaining: “The man was an absolute legend, but the competition wasn’t as good back then as it is today.”
Since prize money has increased significantly in recent years, more and more people are trying out darts, said the busy promoter. He doesn’t expect Littler to “take everything for himself”, “but he will have phases of dominance”, predicted Hearn.
“The Nuke” had sensationally made it to the final as a debutant at the last Darts World Championship, where he lost 4:7 in sets to Luke Humphries. Littler was then given a wildcard for the Premier League. A decision that was quite controversial.
Darts: Luke Littler wins the Premier League straight away
“There were some voices within the Professional Darts Corporation saying, ‘Isn’t it a bit early to put a young player under that kind of pressure? There would be at least 10,000 fans every Thursday night for 17 nights – ‘Can he handle it?’ ‘Will it affect his long-term future?’ blah, blah, blah,” Hearn reflected.
Littler proved his doubters wrong and won the elite darts league straight away in his debut season.
“Eddie (Hearn, PDC Chairman, ed.) and I sat down to talk about it and the first thing Eddie said was: ‘It doesn’t matter how old you are, if you’re good enough, you’re old enough’ and our job is to give people a chance and roll the dice and I have to say it really paid off!” Hearn said of the wildcard decision in favour of Littler.
Source: www.sport.de
