Luke Littler has got people talking after he hit back at the Berlin crowd following an uncharacteristic visit of 26 in his Premier League Darts quarter-final defeat to Chris Dobey.
The 18-year-old, who extended his lead at the top of the Premier League last week with a 6-1 final victory over Luke Humphries, failed to capitalise on his good form as he suffered a 6-2 defeat to Dobey on Thursday night.
Littler made a number of uncharacteristic mistakes on the Uber Arena stage.
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And in the third leg, he recorded a visit of 26, which brought a huge cheer from the Berlin crowd. "A couple of weeks ago, he hit a score of 11, and he somehow managed to laugh about it," said commentator Wayne Mardle. "He doesn't care."
As you can see from the footage below, Littler reacted to the jeers by punching the air. In fact, the teenager gesticulated to the crowd to keep going, which led to an even louder response from those in attendance.
Dobey went on to become the first man to beat Littler by a four leg margin in the Premier League this year as he set up a semi-final clash against Gerwyn Price.
Here's how fans reacted to the scenes on Thursday night.
One said: "Luke Littler is getting such a ‘chip’ on his shoulder recently," while another commented: "Littler didn’t seem himself tonight."
A third wrote: "Littler letting the crowd get into his head. Saw it while waiting for the walk on," and a fourth said: "Has to be the worst Littler performances I’ve seen."
A fifth added: "Xhaka vs Arsenal fans vibes from Luke Littler after hitting 26."
Littler's defeat comes shortly after he appeared on an episode of The Overlap's Stick to Football podcast, where he was asked whether he could beat Phil Taylor's record of 16 world titles.
"There's a record there to be broken, but it's going to take some doing," he said. "He also won the World Matchplay 16 times, so he's won two of the big majors 16 times, which is... It'll take some doing."
When former Manchester United midfielder Roy Keane asked whether the competition was "not that good" in Taylor's dominant years – and whether he thinks the competition is higher now – Littler replied: "I think it [the competition] is a lot better now.
"But then, you still Phil Taylor and Eric Bristow, it was still a good field. But nowadays, I think Phil could struggle."
Topics: Luke Littler, Darts
Jack Kenmare