It has been an impressive year for the teenager
Luke Littler is just one win away from a PDC landmark in his first season on tour.
The 17-year-old has enjoyed an impressive breakthrough season, smashing multiple records along the way.
It would be an incredible achievement for someone of his age.
Littler rose to fame at the start of the year after powering to the World Darts Championship final at Alexandra Palace.
His impressive run of victories came to an end when he was beaten by Luke Humphries in the final.
He then went on to win the Premier League Darts on his first appearance in the tournament, as well as claiming six other competition victories.
Littler’s tally of 99 puts him ahead of rivals Humphries on 79, Cameron Menzies on 78 and Michael van Gerwen on 77.
To achieve the milestone, he must beat Ross Smith in Amsterdam on Friday evening. Smith is ranked world No 10 while Littler is ranked 22nd.
Earlier this year, Littler became the fastest player to accumulate 500 maxima in a season.
He broke the European Tournament record, hitting 31 180s in the German Championship and now has 513 maximums this season – 200 short of Michael Smith’s record tally of 714 maximums in one year.
PDC stats guru Christopher Kempf believes Littler will break Smith’s record. He told The Sun: “With more than eight months of darts completed in 2024, Littler currently holds the fourth-highest rate of 180s ever seen for a player contesting more than 1000 legs, at 0.362 per leg.
“Should Littler continue throwing maxima at his current rate, and continue to enter enough tournaments and win enough matches in them to maintain that rate, he will break Smith’s record, and even have an outside chance of reaching 800 180s for the first time.
“Littler, by virtue of being a Premier League and European Tour champion in 2024, has already played more than 1400 legs.
“Few players will ever throw as many darts as that, which is effectively necessary to challenge the total 180s record.”
However, legendary darts star Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor worried that Littler might be affected by tiredness.
He said: “He’s done brilliant fair play to the lad. The only thing that will upset Luke at the minute, is the travelling. It is very tiresome and he’s not used to it. It’s not just about darts anymore, there’s a lot more involved.”
Littler will be looking for revenge after Ross Smith knocked him out of the Players Championship 7 in April of this year.
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