Luke Littler is the first sporting superstar of the AI age

With my 52nd birthday just over a week away, I enter 2025 in the knowledge that soon things will never be the same again.

The robots will be taking over. Artificial Intelligence is already dominating our lives so much that I can hardly prepare a meal without checking on ChatGPT how long it takes to cook in my air fryer.

And now we have the robotic age’s first sporting superstar – 17-year-old new darts world champion Luke Littler.

Words like ‘awesome’ lose their impact when they are attached to things like a nice cup of tea, but this was one occasion where it hardly did the job.

His victory over Michael van Gerwen in Friday’s PDC World Darts Championship final was a performance for the ages and I can draw only two parallels.

The first was in 1986 when I saw the then 20-year-old Mike Tyson – an equivalent babe in boxing terms – leaving Trevor Berbick wobbling all over the ring in the second round at the Las Vegas Hilton.

It was a performance of such savagery it left me thinking no one would be able to stand up when they fought him in the next 15 years, let alone knock him out.

That’s why I didn’t watch him the other week taking on some YouTuber for a hefty purse at the age of 58. I’ll remember him at his peak, thanks.

The other was in 1997 when Tiger Woods recovered from shooting 40 in the first nine holes of his professional debut at Augusta to go on and win The Masters by 12 shots.

His true greatness was born that weekend in Georgia. There was no sign of him taking it easy. He had the world’s most prestigious tournament, containing the cream of the planet’s talent, by the throat and he wasn’t going to let go.

Littler is no robot off the oche. He comes across as an amiable young lad who is coping well with being the main attraction at darts tournaments, the most famous player in the country and the darling of Sky Sports.

But it was like he has been programmed to play arrers. It seems someone just flicks a switch and he could seemingly play 13-dart legs of 501 until the end of time.

Precocious teenage talents have graced sporting arenas for years, so what makes Littler so different?

We’ve seen great young talent before. We’ve seen a pint-sized Rory McIlroy chipping a golf ball into a washing machine. We’ve seen Boris Becker come from nowhere to win Wimbledon.

But teenage sporting sensations tend to have the carefree attitude of the school playground. Think of Wayne Rooney at Euro 2004 playing like he was out with his mates on the streets of Croxteth while dominating some of the best footballers in the world.

Littler is different. He has that steel that is usually seen as a characteristic earned through years of toil and experience.

The mental strength he demonstrated at Ally Pally was almost unique. Woods in his pomp is the only time that merits comparison.

Let’s face it. He turned up to that final against Van Gerwen, arguably the third greatest darts player of all time behind Phil Taylor and Eric Bristow, and ground him into the dirt.

He was nerveless. Just nerveless.

We witnessed seasoned dartists, and very good ones at that, crumbling in his presence over the last couple of weeks.

Watching darts for me is put in the same bracket as mince pies in that it is not for life, it is just for Christmas.

Those who pay closer attention would be able to offer more insight as to whether he could be prone to going the wrong way or if he will continue to dominate the game for decades like Taylor did.

Perhaps one of those thousands of youngsters who have taken up the sport at academies across the country inspired by the Warrington wonderkid will go toe-to-toe with him soon.

They will no doubt symbolise what is a noticeable characteristic of young people generally that Littler has in spades – they are not scared to do things. They won’t listen when folks say they can’t achieve what people never thought they could.

How can we have a world darts champion who wouldn’t get served in a pub?

Well, we have and it’s the dawn of a new era. And some of us dinosaurs are going to have to get used to it.

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