Luke Littler is just the start - talent tsunami is on the way in darts, says Barry Hearn
Barry Hearn sat down with Sky Sports to discuss the rise of Luke Littler, the pressure on existing top players, the future of the Worlds at Alexandra Palace and more; watch every session of the World Darts Championship from December 15-January 3 live on Sky Sports
Friday 6 December 2024 13:25, UK
Barry Hearn has warned top darts players they need to "start again" to keep competing with the "tsunami" of talent coming.
In a wide-ranging interview with Sky Sports, Hearn discussed how the emergence of Luke Littler could just be the start of a new era of darting talent and the challenge that presents for players who have been comfortably at the top of the PDC Order of Merit.
Hearn also discussed if the future of the World Darts Championship is at Alexandra Palace, why a bigger venue might be the answer and how he wants to provide more opportunities for the general public to attend.
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The PDC president then took a look back at his more than 20 years with the sport and gave his opinion on whether darts is currently in its best era yet...
Is the emergence of so much new talent a shock to the 'top players'?
If I was what I call an existing top player, I would be going back to the dartboard and starting again, because they are going to be put under the cosh by these kids.
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They've got used to their lifestyle, they've got used to their big cheques coming in and suddenly they're playing someone who hasn't got any fear.
These kids, it's their career. They actually know it's going to take them some time so they're not necessarily in a rush.
But they haven't got the pressure on them of someone else who's maybe got [a] wife, children, mortgages, all the usual pressures that exist. These kids haven't got that. They're just going at it like Luke Littler.
So what are you going to do with your winnings? I don't know. I'm going to go home and play my Xbox. That's frighteningly dangerous.
There is a tsunami of talent coming and these guys have got a very simple choice. Do they retire? Do they go back to the drawing board? Perhaps they've got a little bit complacent in their attitude.
A top darts player can earn £2m, £3m - maybe more, in Luke Littler's case - a year.
It's not boxers' money but then boxers fight once every four months. These guys are going at it every week.
That safety net has gone completely in darts. So the unknown is - and I've been around it for 20-odd years now - it's tough to pick a winner.
Years ago, you could go through the top 16 or the first-round matches and pick 90 per cent of the winners.
Today, if I got 50 per cent, I'd be surprised. That's a very healthy side of the sport.
It's frustrating for those that think they've earned the protection of a ranking. But on a two-year ranking, it's fair to everybody.
If you don't produce in two years, you deserve to drop down. And it works the other way for these top kids. They've got two years.
The PDC's responsibility is not to help people win but to give them the opportunity to change their lives.
Will the World Darts Championship leave Alexandra Palace?
We never rush things at the PDC. We've grown a great business and the players have been fabulous in its expansion.
But, clearly, we've got to not just grow the business in terms of tickets and viewers, but in terms of prize money.
So we have to generate more and more income, so that we can pay more and more prize money. That's common sense.
The way to do that, however, is difficult, because the atmosphere at Alexandra Palace is fabulous. It's something special.
We can't get another seat in the hall we're using. The bigger hall at Alexandra Palace is not really fit for purpose, frankly.
So by making the event bigger, by making effectively four more days of darts - which is eight sessions - that adds 25,000 tickets to the 90,000 I sold in about five minutes.
When we drew the line this year and said, 'OK, that's it, every ticket sold', I asked my technical department to market the tickets.
I obviously understand the principles of supply and demand. How many tickets could we have sold if we had them? Bearing in mind we sold 90,000 very quickly, their answer was somewhere in between 300,000 and 350,000 tickets, judging by the number of people waiting online.
I need to satisfy the paying public. It's no good saying we've got the biggest event in the world if after a while, people get so frustrated not being able to get a ticket, they move their attention elsewhere. We're not going to let that happen.
So next year, make it bigger. Then we've got to look at it in a practical term and say, 'Do we go somewhere else?' Realistically, I could sell 6,000, 7,000, 8,000 tickets a session, instead of 3,500.
In revenue terms, that adds to it, but also it means I'm not disappointing the darts fans who want that experience of watching one of the greatest shows on earth.
How do you keep the Worlds atmosphere in a bigger venue?
You can stage it in such a way. You can light it in such a way. There's lots of things you can do but obviously the atmosphere at Circus Tavern with 800 people there was electric. You do dilute slightly by making it bigger.
But the upside of that is you're satisfying so many more customers who dream of going once in their lifetime, or have been going for years. Suddenly they can't get a ticket.
My big goal is to try and keep the ticket prices as reasonably priced as I can. I could treble the ticket price, quadruple the ticket price at Alexandra Palace and still sell out. But that's not our plan.
We're trying to make it affordable, but we just need more people to join the party so that we can still increase prize money.
In view of the levels of interest we get, last year's rating was the best Sky have ever done in 30 years. I think it's the biggest sporting event Sky did outside of football.
We've all got working-class roots. Remember the ordinary guy that's been coming for years. When you think that we're £40 a ticket starting price and you think of the price of virtually any other show, even going to the cinema, and yet we're supplying the greatest show on earth.
We're in the best place in my 50 years of promoting sport. I have never seen a sport in the place that darts is in. Now the responsibility of taking that forward and spreading it as a global game falls to us.
Why do we want to make the World Championships bigger? Simply because we've got countries saying, 'Why haven't we got a spot in the World Championships?' If we are to be a global sport then we've got to open those doors to those aspiring kids and the darts players generally.
How many more Luke Littler's will we see?
I think Luke Littler is the flag bearer for the youth. I think there's an army looking at him saying, 'Do you know what? I've just come out of my bedroom and I've averaged 120.' They're coming out in their droves.
I have this recurring nightmare that I find a player that has a nine-darter every throw and he ruins the game because he takes away that moment.
It's like a golfer having 18 holes in one. It's not going to happen. But the standard from these kids is... if they can cope and hold themselves together, when they have a good day, they can beat any player in the world.
When people say to me, 'Do you think Luke Littler is going to be the greatest player of all time? Can he beat Phil Taylor's 16 World Championships?' I think he could, but it's not going to be easy because of the competition that's coming up.
Is darts in its best era yet?
It seems to be stages. When we first started out together, somewhere around 2000, there were little bumps in the road initially because of the disputes, and breaking away from the British Darts Organisation.
Then Sky came to the rescue, and they just created this relationship between darts and the British public that has just grown and grown each year.
I've tried to analyse why because obviously I'm very happy with it, but I want to know why. I pinch myself every time I go to a darts event and I remember the Circus Tavern with 800 people going crazy.
Over the last 20 years, there's a blur in terms of just so many people watching it.
You started off with the great Phil Taylor, the 16-time world champ, and you think he's the best thing I've ever seen since sliced bread, and then along comes Michael Van Gerwen, and then along comes Michael Smith and all these great players, and suddenly the gift that keeps on giving - Luke Littler - arrives.
No one, including myself, saw that happening. But it just takes it up. Everything seems to take darts up another notch.
So it does become the hottest ticket in British sport. It's easier to get a ticket for the Champions League football than it is to get a ticket for the darts.
So I've just got to be so happy. I'm not going to really question how and why it's happened. I'm just going to accept it gratefully and say, 'Let's see where we can go' because I think we've only just started.
That's a frightening thing to say at my age but I think there's a huge amount of more growth left in it, because the British public have spoken. They want it and they want to be part of it, and kids all over the world want to be the next Luke Littler.
Once you've got that, it's a difficult avalanche to stop. Because I think it's the personalities and the characters that bring people initially into darts.
The perception is, it's a great party, it's a great night out, it's value for money. All of a sudden we are seeing something very, very special.
Luke Littler, Luke Humphries - that rivalry will run and run. But don't be surprised in the Worlds that you get a few shocks because the quality out there... everyone can have a day where they don't miss.
On that day, they beat everyone else in the world.
When will the World Darts Championship take place?
The tournament gets underway at Alexandra Palace on Sunday December 15, with three first-round matches and one second-round match on the opening evening.
There will be live darts over each of the following eight days, including seven afternoon sessions, with the usual three-day break from Christmas Eve to Boxing Day, before returning with the third round and a double session on December 27.
The third and fourth rounds will be completed by December 30, before a night off on New Year's Eve, with the quarter-finals held across two sessions on New Year's Day, ahead of the semi-finals on January 2 and the final on Friday January 3.
The full day-by-day schedule for this year's tournament can be found here.
Who will win the Paddy Power World Darts Championship? Watch every match exclusively live from December 15-January 3 on Sky Sports' dedicated darts channel. Get Sky Sports or stream with NOW.
