Luke Littler is set to take on Michael van Gerwen in the final of the Paddy Power PDC World Darts Championship, but some cheerleading chaos almost stopped his semi-final bout
Luke Littler is into a second consecutive Paddy Power World Darts Championship.
The Nuke, 17, dispatched Stephen Bunting en route to the final on Thursday (January 2), but it almost didn’t happen after some cheerleading chaos at the Alexandra Palace. In-between sets cheerleaders often entertain the fans – and such stunt sees them fire t-shirts into the crowd.
However, one t-shirt fired out of a canon accidentally got caught on the Spidercam – which is the sweeping camera used to give fans a better view of the action.
With the monitor covered technicians scrambled to fix the situation before Littler and Bunting made their way back onto the stage. The camera had also stopped sending signals, and it took 20 minutes for it to be fixed.
Littler would go onto beat Bunting, setting up a final with Mighty Mike, who had just overcome Chris Dobey in the other semi-final.
“Everyone else is looking forward to it more than I am, but if I win seven sets I will be happy,” Littler said in his post-match press conference. “Michael has been in numerous finals, this is my second, I know where I went wrong last year and I am sure I will fix it.
“It will mean everything, if I win seven sets I’ll be over the moon. I can’t wait to get on stage. It’s the stuff of dreams, everyone wants to pick up a trophy, but you have to be at the top of your game to do it.”
He added: “Every night before I do play a game I’ve slept, I’ve slept well, whereas last year I wasn’t sleeping at all because I was just ready for the next game. But this year it’s a lot different. As soon as I knew back-to-back finals, it’s just chill out, reset the batteries and go again.”