Littler needs guidance to avoid mistakes of others

‘I was the future once,’ uttered David Cameron when he took his final Prime Minister’s questions in the House of Commons in 2016, having helped tear politics as we know it apart in Britain with the holding of a Brexit referendum that backfired spectacularly.

The former Conservative leader is now back in the cut and thrust of domestic politics in the UK after his shock appointment to Rishi Sunak’s Cabinet as Foreign Secretary before Christmas.

Cameron’s appointment hardly pointed to the future – if anything, it’s Sunak attempting to cling on by turning to the past.

One person though that certainly has captured the imagination of the UK public, in a sporting sense, is a man of the future – 16-year-old Luke Littler. The Warrington youngster took the sporting world by storm over the Christmas period by staging a quite remarkable run through the PDC World Darts Championship, which eventually culminated in a final loss to Luke Humphries.

Littler’s stunning progress turned darts into the be all and end all of the sporting schedule over the festive period. The Sky Sports viewership figures for the final blew all other comparable events out of the water in terms of their numbers.

The audience peak of 3.7 million was the highest non-football number Sky Sports has ever recorded and such was the interest in Littler's progress that the House of Commons heard calls from some media savvy MPs that the final should be broadcast free-to-air, as opposed to behind the Sky paywall.

The true mark of a sportsperson’s ability to chime with the public is whether they are front page news – and Littler was splashed across virtually every paper at some stage over the last few weeks.

His measured, composed performances, both on stage and behind the mic in interviews, belied his tender age. Despite the mass hysteria surrounding him, Luke Littler displayed a level of composure players double and treble his age have.

One such point came in his semi-final win over 2018 champion Rob Cross, who rattled Littler early on in that contest. Yet the young man bounced back and managed to carve his path through to the final and while he ultimately came unstuck in the decider, the sky certainly is the limit.

Even after coming up short, Littler was still front and centre in the media limelight the following day when he was selected to participate in the lucrative Premier League Darts tournament, which goes from venue to venue, city to city, over sixteen weeks bringing the carnival to arenas across the UK and Ireland, with Belfast and Dublin included in the itinerary.

In many ways, Littler losing the final may have been a blessing. If he won, regardless of what he managed to do later in his career, there is no topping conquering the world at the age of 16. Given that darts is a game in which there is very little reason to suggest a player can't have a career longer than in most other sports, Littler has every chance of winning at least one title over the coming years. The man with one of the best nicknames in sport, Steve Beaton, played in his 33rd World Championship this time round at Alexandra Palace. The Bronzed Adonis isn't doing too bad.

Inevitably, Littler's heroics have led to comparisons with others who achieved great things at such a young age and, given the news of late, it was hard not to be drawn to one person in particular. Has there ever been a more underappreciated footballer than Wayne Rooney?

He's only 38 years of age yet Rooney’s stock has plummeted following a dreadful stint as boss at Birmingham City where he managed just two wins in fifteen and oversaw a drop to 20th in the Championship table – fourteen places lower than where the club was at when the ex-England star took over from John Eustace in October.

At the age of 16, Rooney was taking the Premier League by storm in the blue of Everton. Though he made his debut earlier that season, Rooney's rise to prominence came in October of 2022, when his stunning strike at Goodison Park helped bring to an end Arsenal's 30-game unbeaten run. Like Littler, he then became a media sensation – how would you say it worked out?

Quite well, by any stretch.

Moving to Manchester United two years later, Rooney went on to become the club's all-time leading goalscorer and won virtually everything there is to win in the club game. At international level, his collection of 120 caps is second only to Peter Shilton.

Indeed, even after his playing career petered out, Rooney's standing remained relatively high with a reasonable stint at Derby County. A trip to the US followed for a spell in charge of DC United, but the woeful spell at Birmingham means Rooney's pedigree as a manager is being questioned before he even reaches 40.

What can Luke Littler and those around him learn from the story and others who might have come to stardom at a tender age?

Just two months ago, Rooney gave a revealing interview to ex-rugby league star and Motor Neurone Disease campaigner Rob Burrow on his podcast in which he admitted he wouldn't move out of the house and would drink almost until he passed out in an effort to deal with the fame and pressures of being such a star in his early 20s.

“I didn't want to be around people because sometimes you feel embarrassed and sometimes you feel like you’ve let people down.

“Ultimately I didn't know how else to deal with it, so I chose alcohol to try and help me get through that.” 

The fame which has been thrust upon Luke Littler in such a short space of time means he will have pressures attached to him from now until the day his career comes to an end, whenever that may be. He, and those analysing his performances, should remember that this is a kid with a talent.

Hopefully, those in positions of power in the sport of darts will be mindful too of the person at the heart of it all as he bids to make the future his own.