Littler races into semis but Humphries knocked out

Before second seed Luke Humphries was defeated by rising star Gian van Veen, Luke Littler received a wildly positive response from the Alexandra Palace crowd as he advanced to the PDC World Championship semi-finals.

Littler, the reigning champion and booed by some fans at his previous match on Monday, won 5-0 over Poland’s Krzysztof Ratajski and will next face fellow Englishman Ryan Searle.

After defeating 2024 world champion Humphries, who was widely thought to be Littler’s biggest challenger for the title in London, Dutchman Van Veen, 23, moves up to third place in the PDC world rankings.

Van Veen won three significant televised tournaments in 2025, including the European Championship final in October, with an average of 105.

The top seed, Van Veen, expressed his excitement to Sky Sports.

“It was the European Championship final,” I said when someone inquired about the final game if it was the biggest win of my career.

Before a dart was thrown, Littler was introduced by MC John McDonald and then faced Ratajski, but the crowd quickly drowned out the crowd singing along to his walk-on song.

Littler won 12 of the subsequent 15 legs to defeat unseeded Ratajski, and he produced a superb 170 checkout to win the first set.

He continued, “A few boos here and there, but the crowd was unbearably large once I arrived on stage.”

My family and friends were just like, “everything happens, happens,” in the lead up to it.

“I clapped everyone so they knew I wanted them by my side once more when I first arrived on stage.” Tonight, they helped me accomplish my goal, and I received it.

I’m developing mentally as a player. I am aware of how to handle it.

Searle reached his first World Championship quarter-final after winning 14 sets without giving a reply.

The 38-year-old extended that streak to 17 with some effective play in the opening three sets against Jonny Clayton.

One of his three ton-plus checkouts in the match, a 111 finish in the final leg of the fifth, secured a spot in the final four.

The Welsh fifth seed, who only managed to get 10 of his 40 doubles attempts, did better during his extended quarter-final performances, but too many missed attempts on the outer ring cost him.

Searle, in contrast, attempted 17 shots on 17 of them.

He wears contact lenses because he has a genetic eye condition called dominant optic atrophy, which impairs his vision.

He continued, “I can’t see particularly well.

When trying to play darts, other people “try not to let that hold you back.”

Justin Hood’s extraordinary run was ended by Anderson, who for the first time in four years reached the semi-finals.

Before Scotland’s 55-year-old Anderson stepped on the accelerator and won nine of the next ten legs to clinch a convincing victory, their quarter-final match was split in the first four sets.

English left-hander Hood, 32, has won a lot of praise for his play and gained acclaim for it when he made his debut appearance at Alexandra Palace.