Luke Littler retains darts world title.
There used to be a time when darts held all the appeal of a council meeting in a local town hall or the dullest political discussion you were ever likely to hear. It had all the excitement and mystique of beige wallpaper or an afternoon spent asking the late and great comedian Tony Hancock about ways of relieving the tedium of a Sunday lunch. Poor Sid James. He had no idea. So James went back to reading the News of the World and Hancock just sighed with an anguished cry, misunderstood and always at war with the world.
So there they were gathered last night at Alexander Palace for the PDC darts world championship final and a young gentleman named Luke Littler retained his world darts title. Now, in the bigger scheme of things, that may have mattered to nobody in particular. You see darts has developed something of a reputation over the decades, a notoriety that may be totally undeserving and a foul stigma which, to the experts and pundits, belongs on both TV and in some ancient low timber beamed pub in the country.
Here they love their darts, treasure and nurture it as if it were its child or baby, a precious offspring that needs constant tender loving care. And so it was Luke Littler, barely out of his teens and still wearing the air of a young child rummaging around the toy shop, who triumphed yet again. There are so many misconceptions about the world of darts that it may be best not to go into any kind of detailed analysis about it. It's a sign of a mis-spent youth, a guilty pleasure, a relaxing pub game but about as sporting and physically demanding as dominoes or shove ha'penny. Or so some might say.
And yet the evidence is there for all to see. Darts is big business, the sport of millionaires, financially rewarding and a decent spectacle there to be appreciated by a captive and enthusiastic audience. Darts is highly prestigious and last night we discovered why. By the end of the evening, Luke Littler was a millionaire and didn't they know it? The cynics were devouring their peanuts and drinking their copious jugs of lager as if it were going out of business. They recognised the magnitude of Littler's achievement even though the sceptics were less than convinced.
According to some, darts is just degrading to the naked eye, a hideous sight for sore eyes, designed only to entertain the kind of people who spend some nights in the pub joking and laughing light heartedly about those wretched politicians who keep messing up the economy. So for years and decades we've found ourselves caught up in the current saloon conversation and dismissing darts as an enjoyable hobby but no more than that.
It must have been over 50 years ago that darts was viewed an astonishingly popular attraction. Every Saturday afternoon London Weekend Television's sports programme World of Sport prominently featured a major darts championship at tea time. The late and great Dickie Davies, that charming TV personality who used to be a cruise ship entertainer, would sit at his desk trying desperately to stifle his laughter. There was a sense that Davies may have been just very diplomatic and simply keeping his thoughts to himself.
And then it happened. It was over to Alexander Palace in North London or the Purfleet Leisure Centre in leafy and bucolic Essex. For this was the regular venue for everything associated with darts. It was a vast hall surrounded by boisterous, roistering men who cheered from the rafters every time a dart was thrown at a board. The rafters were shaking and the foundations trembling. Darts had class, social status, an earnest and business like air about it. It was now very important and had to be respected.
But above all there was the booze, the obsessive alcohol intake at times, much to the detriment of your health but who cared? Out in the audience there were innumerable tables groaning with vast quantities of Guinness, Heineken, Fosters and, in the old days, Mackeson. But darts was up and running, hitting the ground by doing so. It was full speed, full pelt, in your eyes, pumped up adrenaline, cigarette smoke curling into the air rather like incense or some mysterious ceremony, the best thing since sliced bread.
No longer now would darts would be regarded with a dismissive and contemptuous shrug of the shoulders, a snooty raising of the eye balls, the look of some appalled government official who had just seen the vile misdemeanours of a hardened criminal. How dare they inflict darts on the public? This is an affront to the intelligence of those who can see no point in it. It was deeply offensive, loud, somehow common and a vulgar pastime. But let's hold back for a minute. It is a hugely impressive sport which has the capacity to make vast amounts of money so it had to be admired.
Back in the 1970s darts had the charismatic Eric Bristow, the formidable Scot Jocky Wilson, the bubbly Bobby George and a whole gallery of the great and good. Whole days would be dedicated to the pursuit of throwing tungsten darts or arrows, as they're now referred to, at a black and red board. Both Bristow and Wilson were the heaviest of smokers and drank life fish as became readily apparent. After a series of games both men would find themselves required to score that elusive 180 for the umpteenth time. Darts failed to have the desired impact on your senses. But darts just kept building its fanbase.
But then we reserved judgment on darts because we were never entirely sure why or how this pub based activity had caught our imagination. What could be so gripping about a game that needed no physical exertion whatsoever and left you numb and underwhelmed? Last night, Luke Littler, who learnt his trade in St Helens where our lovely son and daughter in law and stunning grandchildren used to live, emerged, at the end of his PDC world title final with the Dutchman Gian van Geen, victorious.
The applause for Littler's world title winning moment could be heard in the Cotswolds. Littler wore his silk shirt with inordinate pride and bunched his fists together as if he'd just won the Lottery once again. He grinned for what seemed like an age and the enraptured fans at Ally Pally just exploded. The score was 7-1 to Littler but this seemed insignificant because a win was a win for Littler and, besides, for a teenager, this was just fairy tale territory.
For Littler's family, this was the crowning moment of glory for their precious son. Not only was he a world champion once but he'd done it again so let's hear it for Luke Littler, the boy from Warrington, the kid who none of us had reckoned with because he was just a young adult and therefore perhaps underage. Littler should have been at university studying for an English, Maths or History Degree or dealing on the City trading floor, a man with stocks and shares in everything. He should have been a lawyer or professor, mathematician or some aspirational Etonian student. Darts was simply unacceptable, revolting and distasteful. And yet Littler is a millionaire again and he had the last word. Luke Littler is world darts champion. Now that sounds good, doesn't it? Nobody can possibly argue with him on that point. Well done Luke.
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