WORLD champion Luke Littler’s new challenge starts later this week.

The Warrington 17-year-old will take to the oche for the first time since his Alexandra Palace crowning glory on January 3.

He will go into the first event of the 2025 World Series – the Bahrain Darts Masters – looking to defend the first senior title of his career that he won this time last year.

But the new king of darts may find things different from now on.

Winning the PDC World Darts Championship, by beating three-times past winner Michael van Gerwen 7-3 in the blockbuster showdown, now means he has a target on his back.

Whatever the sport, whatever the level, the champion is there to be shot at – and there will be no shortage of takers looking to get a famous scalp as the season unfolds.

The former Padgate Academy student can expect the competition he faces to be fiercer in whatever competition he contests.

The psychology in the build-up to the Bahrain Darts Masters this year contrasts deeply to 2024.

After the heartbreak of losing in the world championship final to Luke Humphries last year, he went to the Bahrain International Circuit looking to prove his amazing performance in reaching the decider on his debut at the age of 16 was no fluke.

And he rammed home the point incredibly against some of the sport’s biggest names, becoming the youngest player to throw a televised perfect nine-darter in the opening leg of his 6-3 quarter-final win against Nathan Aspinall.

There was an impressive ‘big fish’ 170 finish as he swept aside Gerwyn Price 7-3 in the semi-finals and then he got the better of Dutch legend Van Gerwen 8-5 in the final.

It was the first of his 10 titles won in 2024 and brought him a growing army of admirers.

On Thursday, though, he will walk out onto a stage as the world champion for the first time and therefore his head will be in a different place.

His mindset could prove to be even better positioned though, determined to not only successfully defend his Bahrain title but to issue an early warning that he has the steel to step up his game as others attempt to knock him off his perch.

Only one loss – and that was in the Players Championship Finals to world number one Humphries – in his last 20 matches across three competitions is a feat of remarkable consistency that Littler will want to enhance, too.