Luke Littler makes feelings clear as 15-year-old darts sensation left gutted

Luke Littler has sent a five-word message to darts’ new teenage sensation after 15-year-old Mitchell Lawrie produced another outstanding performance at Lakeside

Luke Littler has been left astounded by a 15-year-old darting sensation. Mitchell Lawrie, born in 2010, has been starring on the Lakeside stage at the WDF World Championship this past week.

On Sunday, Lawrie eclipsed Littler’s record and became the youngest player to win at Lakeside when he beat Japan’s Tomoya Maruyama in comprehensive fashion. Lawrie then followed that up to beat last year’s semi-finalist Jason Brandon 3-0, with the teenager hitting five maximums and some impressive checkouts.

As well as this, Lawrie finished with a 97.21 average – the highest at the tournament so far.

Reacting to Lawrie on the WDF Darts Instagram account, Littler wrote: “This kid is a joke.”

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Lawrie was beaming with pride after he dispatched Brandon in straight sets and qualified for the next round. “I’m absolutely buzzing with myself, to be honest,” the Scot said.

“Obviously the number two seed – he’s a very good, experienced player as well. He got to the semi-finals here last year, so I knew I was up against it from the start.”

“I went in there knowing I needed to start very fast and luckily I did that,” he added. “I don’t think I had a leg under 15 in the first set, but no, I was very happy with the way I played.”

Lawrie came out of the blocks fast in the first set, finishing every leg within less than 15 darts. There was a slight disappointment as he briefly headed toward a possible nine darter, but was unable to land it before drilling a superb 134 checkout.

He continued: “Yes – I could have hit the nine! No, honestly, it was great. I think the crowd were with me from the start. As soon as I hit the 180, they were all on my side. So yes, it was great. The crowd were great as well.”

As Lawrie began to head to the finish line, he slumped slightly. This was because Brandon started to come alive and score big. However, that made Lawrie step up his game once more and cruise to victory.Lawrie admitted: “My start was very strong. I kind of fell asleep a little bit in the last set – not that I thought I’d won it, but then he started hitting scores and I woke up again, thankfully.”

When asked if there were nerves when going at his first match darts, Lawrie finished: “Again, no – I just missed. I don’t know how to explain it. I don’t know what happened. It was double two, I missed it. “I think there was just one guy who was shouting, ‘Come on, Jason!’ the whole time I was trying to throw, but except for that the crowd were great.”