"Had a kebab after my first win and didn't have another in two weeks": Luke Littler debunks fabricated stories during rise to stardom

Luke Littler's darting rise made way for a media circus in which every column inch was dedicated to the then 16-year-old who has recently turned 17, won the Bahrain Darts Masters after reaching the World Championship final and then losing to Michael van Gerwen narrowly in the final of the Dutch Darts Masters this past weekend.

But it has also seen a lot of fabrications in the mind of Littler including in regards to his supposed kebab after every match and also how he met his girlfriend, Eloise Milburn in a relationship which came under criticism due to her being 21 and Littler being 16 as well as the story they met on FIFA which he soon also debunked.

Speaking to The Guardian's Donald McRae, it is abuse that he was ready for and that now he has people looking after his Instagram to stop the barrage of abuse that the likes of Fallon Sherrock before him and in other sports, Emma Raducanu has received since success.

“That’s what I knew from the very start,” Littler says on his relationship to The Guardian. “We knew people would find out [about their relationship] but it started off very bad. As the weeks go on [the abuse of Milburn on social media] has been almost forgotten. We’ve been talking for a few months now. I’ve brung her along to the worlds, got to the final and whatever people say, they can say it. It’s not going to affect me or my mental strength. I’ve got guys doing my Instagram now and they delete it before I see it.”

On supposedly meeting on FIFA, Littler laughed when asked about it and told the real story. “No. That was a weird story they made up. We met on the development tour in Leicester in August but became friends at the last [tournament] in Milton Keynes.”

Being hounded since he reached the World final, he said he had to run off to a house in the middle of nowhere to escape the constant barrage before he turned 17 which was a simple affair. "We went for a Chinese in St Helens and I only got spotted by three people, so that was good. They clocked me but waited until we’d finished and got a picture, so that was all right. It’s calmed down since the worlds. That was crazy. The press were on me until we escaped to a house on a hill in the middle of nowhere in Wales. They’ve not been around so much since then but it’s one of those things with plane-loads of fame and plane-loads of followers. It’s certainly changed my life," he said.

His dizzying rise saw him go from a highly touted 16-year-old to a worldwide story and has seen him mingle with his favourite Manchester United players. But how was it at the time? “Every night. I was awake until five every morning, on my phone, refreshing Instagram, seeing my followers go up. Before my first round against Christian Kist I had 4,000 followers and it went crazy. I’m the most followed darts player on Instagram with 1.1 million now.”

Another fabrication surrounded him having a kebab after every match, with media outlets flocking to have him pictured with the takeaway item. “I had a kebab after my first win and didn’t have another in two weeks.” Despite that though, he has helped out takeaways including his favourite in Warrington with business as a result of his success. “That’s my mate’s place and they’ve now got the Luke Wrap under my name. I walked in yesterday and got a burger and chips. They showed me two orders for my wraps and they’ve now got to replace the big doner meat every three days. They’ve also got a barber’s shop, Hamidos, so they give me free haircuts now.”