This evening, while millions will be watching the great and the good of British public life trying to secure approximately £100,000 for charity in the final of Celebrity Traitors on BBC One, Luke Littler will be on Netflix attempting to stop 20 amateur darts players winning five times that amount of money.
A mighty £501,000 will go to anyone who can beat world No 1 and double reigning world champion Littler in a single leg of darts in a show creatively called, erm... Beat Luke Littler. A slightly ‘Ronseal’ approach to television programme titling, perhaps, but there is something to be said for that.
You’d be well within your rights to scoff that “obviously a bloke from down the pub won’t beat the best darts player in the world” but – amid some very mild controversy – these amateurs aren’t blokes from down the pub. Or at least not just blokes from down the pub.
Fallon Sherrock – best known for making history as the first woman to win a match at the PDC World Darts Championship at Alexandra Palace back in 2019 – reigning world youth champion Mitchell Lawrie and Ashley Coleman, who currently sits 34th in the PDC Challenge Tour rankings, are among the 24 selected amateurs (this will be whittled down to 20 on the evening via a series of votes).
There is also a bin man, a restaurant manager at Nando’s, a driving instructor, an electrical engineer and a recruitment manager (boo!) in the group of hopefuls but it is certainly not limited to purely pub players.
“When you start talking about what an amateur is, it’s quite difficult,” insisted Richard Osman, who will co-host Beat Luke Littler alongside Goalhanger stablemate Gary Lineker, on his Rest Is Entertainment podcast this week.
“Darts has various tours. You’ve got the PDC, which is the famous one, then you’ve got the Modus tour, you’ve got Challenger tours and you’ve got all sorts of people who are playing darts for money across the year.
“If you exclude every single person who enters the last 256 of a Challenger tournament, there are no darts players left who would be able to do this thing. So what we essentially have said is that if you don’t have a PDC tour card, you can play in this game. There’s some very, very, very highly-ranked darts players in those 20.”
Netflix went through an extensive, The X Factor-style open audition process to select the amateurs, in which anyone who checked out a leg in 24 darts or fewer was eligible to be selected, with a panel including the likes of 16-time world champion Phil Taylor, ex-pro Laura Turner and former PDC chairman Barry Hearn helping choose. These aren’t complete no-hopers by any stretch of the imagination and, in fact, 15-year-old Lawrie has beaten Littler in multiple 501 legs before – securing a 4-3 victory over him at the World Cup junior darts tournament in 2023.
The stats suggest that the chances of Littler winning 20 legs on the spin against this rag-tag group of opponents is pretty slim. As soon as the teenager loses a leg, it’s over – whether that comes 15 minutes into the three-hour special or right at the end. “We’ve got 20 players and if the first person beats Luke Littler they win £501,000 and that is it,” explained Osman. “The money is gone and that is 15 minutes of television for the price of three hours worth of television. Netflix understand that. All sports fans understand that.”
Bookies are generally pricing Littler around 2/9 to lose at some point in the evening or 3/1 for him to go unbeaten, perhaps partly influenced by his mediocre recent form, which included early exits in the World Grand Prix and European Championships, although he averages a ludicrous 101.33 in the past 12 months, with a first nine dart average of 111.75.
Osman believes the world champion has around an 85 per cent chance of winning each leg but only around 15 per cent of winning 20 in a row. In fact, the co-host claims there is only one reason that all 20 amateurs will fail – pressure.
“I would be shocked beyond words if we don’t give away £501,000,” added Osman. “It’s really exciting. You’re going to see somebody throwing one dart for half a million pounds. That’s the only thing that makes me sort of hesitate in my judgement.
“I know those players good enough that one of them, out of 20, will beat him. He’ll have an off leg, they’ll have a good leg. But they are going to have to, in front of a big live audience, throw a single dart at a single double for £501,000. And is that humanly possible would be my question. It’s incredibly exciting.”
The glorious truth for Littler is that, regardless of the result, he can’t lose. If he beats all 20 opponents he will have defied the bookmakers, experts and mathematicians while increasing his aura of darting invincibility. Presuming viewing figures are decent, it would perfectly set up a Beat Luke Littler II at some point in the future – 20 have already failed, can you do the impossible and beat the best?
If he is beaten? It certainly doesn’t damage his reputation – there’s no shame in losing a one-off leg to a perfectly capable player, even an amateur. In fact, it’s a better story and would provide greater publicity for the show if someone does triumph. They would be able to brand themselves as “the person who beat Littler” and interest in the whole concept rises. You could still easily do Beat Luke Littler II if you’re so inclined.
Meanwhile, the exposure for ‘brand Littler’ by being on a Netflix special centred around him is huge regardless. Given his central role in the reboot of Bullseye, ‘The Nuke’ is clearly keen to transcend darts and become a known face in the wider cultural landscape. He’s well on his way to doing so.
The fact he’s already being set up as this mythical beast, who is so invincible that beating him even once is worth half a million pounds, is telling. Sales of the Luke Littler-branded dartboard massively spiked around his 2025 and 2026 World Championship wins and this event will surely boost numbers ahead of Christmas once more.
This concept is a no-brainer for the teenage superstar. He’ll enjoy a fun evening with some competitive edge and the chances of any reputational damage are basically zero, with a good chance that his already ascendant star rises even further. Whatever happens, Luke Littler will be the winner.
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