How taking darts out of the pub spawned Luke Littler and a new generation

For those who believe that you can never take the pub out of darts, the tale of Luke Littler contains an unexpected and largely unknown twist. It is a twist that is transforming the darting apprenticeship from a skill once largely honed in smoked-filled rooms alongside a pint of beer to child-friendly, alcohol-free ‘academies’ in every corner of the world.

“We’ve been waiting for this moment for more than a decade,” says Steve Brown, a former professional who, sensing that generations of children (and their parents) may be turned off by the more traditional route, launched his first academy in the function room above The Bull in Bristol, a pub owned by his father.

The idea has since been replicated across Britain and as far afield as China, Australia and even Mongolia, with Littler – the 16-year-old who fell agonisingly short of winning the World Championship on Wednesday night – being the first product of the Junior Darts Corporation, a fully fledged competitive circuit for children aged eight to 18, to reach this level.

“It was 2010 when I first had the idea,” Brown says. “I was playing on TV at the time and my son was showing a keen interest. I didn’t want him to learn in the traditional way that I learnt, which was go to the pub with my dad, be around a lot of adults in that kind of environment.

“We put a little advert in the paper and, in the first week, 30 kids turned up who all had their own darts, all had their own styles and darts shirts. They were playing in the bedrooms and garages but had nowhere to go. Their parents had the same philosophy as me – and so there was then a bit of a eureka moment and it blossomed from there.”

With a grading system based on martial arts, whereby children start with a white shirt and make their way up to black, the academies organise their sessions in such a way that ensure players get equal board time regardless of their current level.

There are now various layers of the JDC, with children potentially progressing to what is called the Foundation Tour before trying to take their place among the top 32 on the JDC’s Advanced Tour that Littler has dominated over recent years.

“We are preparing them for greatness – these are the next generation of PDC superstars,” says Brown, who now oversees a programme that even includes a Centre of Excellence in Coventry with a media room and streaming studio for YouTube so that players can get used to playing in front of cameras.

Brown first became aware of Littler (who had also spent countless hours practising at home and in pubs with his father Anthony) in 2017, but it was during the Covid-19 lockdown – when Littler was 13 – that he realised he was a special talent.

“There’s always the next big thing, so I try not to get too excited until they have left school, but Luke is an exception to that rule,” Brown says. “I kept waiting for him to plateau but he keeps pushing on and on.

“I was still a professional during Covid so I was playing online to keep my eye in for events. I ended up playing Luke and he absolutely thrashed me.

“I thought, ‘Wow’. He was so good that I wondered if he was cheating. You couldn’t see the player throwing online – just the board. He was phenomenal. It changed my opinion.”

Brown again saw Littler at a tournament in Gibraltar shortly before this World Championship and was so sure of his potential impact that he offered a word of warning as well as good luck.

“I knew how good he was under pressure because I’ve seen him dominate men’s events on the amateur scene for the last two or three years and the stats don’t lie,” Brown says. “He has become so used to winning now that the thought of losing doesn’t enter his mind – he’s playing with no fear and has got no battle scars.

“I was, ‘Luke, make sure you are mentally prepared for the next two weeks because your life is going to change – you are going to get a hell of a lot of attention’. But I wouldn’t be doing these interviews if I didn’t think Luke was mentally strong enough. When he goes on stage, he’s got like a different character.”

The unseen impact of the past two weeks, Brown says, has already been monumental.

“The players are getting younger all the time – and there are certain people on the same trajectory as Luke, not where he is at the moment, but people certainly at the level he was when he was 12.

“Every academy director we have around the country has been absolutely inundated with parents asking their kids to find out where the nearest academy is. We have been working really hard to change people’s perception of the game and this will go a long way.

“When I played as a kid I was embarrassed to tell my friends I was a darts player. It had a stigma. My goal was to try and do my best to change the perception of darts and help turn the kids who play darts into the cool kids at school. This has been massive.”