Luke Littler vs Luke Humphries – World Darts Championship final: Live score and updates as ‘The Nuke’ takes on tournament favourite in bid to become youngest ever winner and secure £500k pay day
Follow Mail Sport’s live blog for the latest score and updates as Luke Littler takes on Luke Humphries in the final of the PDC World Darts Championship.
Classy from Crossy
How about this for a touch of class from Rob Cross?
The 2018 champion was beaten 6-1 despite taking the first set last night, but went straight over to Littler to shake his hand and wish him all the best!
This isn’t a one-off either by the way.
Here’s a little look at Littler nailing a nine-darter at just 14…
Wondering what it’s like at the heart of it all tonight?
Well our man Kieran Gill is at Ally Pally this evening, and here’s just a taster of how things have been heating up ahead of one of the most highly-anticipated games of darts of all time…
Ah, the inevitable half-and-half scarves that seem to plague most sporting events…
A polarising topic in the right crowds, but on a night like tonight – and at the darts no less – you’d be surprised if that’s the biggest fashion faux pas come the end of the evening…
Is there anything better than being World No 1 in your craft?
Well maybe winning the World Championship the very next day – and that’s exactly what Luke Humphries is out here trying to achieve tonight…
‘Bigger than the Ashes’: Luke Littler’s semi-final was watched by 2.32million on Sky Sports
Luke Littler isn’t just breaking darts records – he’s smashing TV milestones too.
A peak of 2.32million people watched his barnstorming semi-final win over Rob Cross on Tuesday night, according to Sky Sports – up 165 per cent on last year’s semi-finals and twice the previous viewing record.
The last record was set in January 2015 when Gary Anderson beat 16-times world champ Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor.
Sky says the figures are on a par with live Premier League, Carabao Cup and Championship playoff peaks – so next time someone tells you darts is niche, you can point to this and tell them to think again.
PDC chairman Eddie Hearn posted on X, formerly Twitter, that the viewing figures were ‘bigger than the Ashes’.
And he’s not wrong: Sky said an average of 965,000 people tuned in across the four days at Headingley in the summer, the highest ever for a Test match.
‘Last night Littler v Cross smashed the record with 2.32m audience! Bigger than the Ashes, bigger than the Ryder Cup let’s break 3m tonight for the final,’ Hearn wrote.
How does one become a darts prodigy at 16…? Asking for a friend.
Well, as with all things there’s got to be a healthy combo of nature and nurture, but you surely need the right teachers showing you the ropes along the way.
Take a lookat the St. Helens talaent factory that might have helped produced a world champion by the end of the night.
As a double winner of this one, as well as almost a dozen other major honours, Gary Anderson should know a thing or two about crackers at the darts.
What were you doing at 16?
Dare we fall into the trap of thinking back to what we were doing when we were just 16?
Pretty sure preparing for a WDC final at Ally Pally tops revising for a GCSE chemistry mock exam…
Fans arrive at Ally Pally ahead of historic final
True to form, Littler was full of jokes about that clash in 2019 ahead of tonight’s match.
It’s only the biggest day of your sporting career, Luke!
At this point, feels like I’m more nervous than he is about it…
Tonight is going to be a herculean clash between the two Lukes, but believe it or not they’ve actually squared off once before.
And no it wasn’t at Ally Pally or any of the great sporting venues that might spring to mind, but in the Hayling Island quarter-final in the halcyon days of November 2019.
Littler was 12 – still staggering that that’s only four years ago – and was edged out by a 24-year-old Humphries on the night.
Who’d have thought that they’d be here on tonight’s stage later just a few years later?
You can take a look at that one at the link below.
Then again, the teenager didn’t exactly scrape through his own last-four tie either with Rob Cross…
Humphries was terrifying in the semis
Humphries didn’t just beat Scott Williams by the way, he whitewashed him 6-0 in a truly, terrifyingly, dominant performance.
Spare a thought for Humphries
Littler is the story of the tournament, and I think even Luke Humphries would be the first to admit that he has been nothing short of sensational.
But his opponent tonight would be the name on everyone else’s lips if it weren’t for the teenage star.
Humphries had only really enjoyed a middling career in darts up until the turn of 2023, never making it past the semis at a major tournament.
But 2023 saw the start of one of the most dominant 12-month periods in the game, with Humphries picking up the World Grand Prix, Grand Slam of Darts and the Players Championship Finals – and he could add the WDC tonight!
Yes, Littler has honestly been pretty breath-taking, but let’s not forget that his opponent has been on one hell of a ride himself in the last year or so!
Is Littler the story of 2024?
We’re what, three days into 2024? Are we already looking at the sporting story of the year?
So put yourself in Littler’s shoes for a moment.
It’s the morning of the biggest day of your entire life, how do you get yourself in the mood to carve your name in the annals of sporting history?
A ham and cheese omelette? Yeah, same.
Here he is, the man of the moment…
It’s just breath-taking how unfazed this guy is by the whole ‘a couple of hours away from sporting immortality’ thing.
It’s just a game, right?
So, what’s the big fuss all about? After all, it’s just two blokes chucking some tiny arrows at a board, right?
Oh you could not be more wrong.
Littler has turned the sport on its head over the course of the last month or so, undergoing a transformation the likes of which nobody would have expected – not even your uncle who claims his mate’s dog’s friend’s goldfish put a fiver on Leicester to win the league in 2016.
Tonight the kid from Warrington could become the youngest ever winner of the WDC in his first appearance.
Don’t underestimate how seismic this is; nobody has done this, nobody thought anyone could get to this point, and it’s pretty likely that nobody ever will again.
All he’s got to do is beat the best ranked player in the entire world. Should be easy right?
Welcome everybody
Forget the Olympics, forget the Euros – we’ve got THE sport event of 2024 coming your way tonight.
That’s right, it’s the PDC World Darts Championship final coming live from Alexandra Palace directly to your feeds as we take you through what has the potential to arguably be the greatest underdog story in sporting history!
16-year-old unseeded Luke Littler takes on World No 1 Luke Humphries tonight at Ally Pally on his tournament debut. Does it get bigger than that?!
We’re expecting the pair out on stage at around 8.20pm, which gives us a little over two hours to build up to what will be a titanic night of darts that none of us will be forgetting in a huryy, so don’t you go anywhere.