Luke Humphries has opened up on the social media abuse he has suffered since becoming World Youth Champion last year.
Humphries who became the first Challenger to win a Premier League match before the lockdown has also reached two World Championship Quarter-Finals in a row
But mainly due to his age at the time of winning the title and his prowess beforehand, he received abuse from certain people for winning in Minehead.
For 'Cool Hand Luke' who opened up last year on his anxiety said that while he is thick skinned; he expected his triumph to be celebrated not brought against him.
“Sometimes it’s hard to sit back and let people, in a way, abuse you online. It’s got very bad in the last five to 10 years the abuse online. Fortunately I’m very hard skinned so I didn’t let it affect me," said Humphries to
DartsWorld.
“I just felt that I wasn’t the only 24-year-old World Youth Champion. Dimitri van den Bergh was 24 last year when he won it but he didn’t get any stick.
“So it was a bit unfair I thought. Seriously though, it was hard. I thought people would celebrate for me especially because of what I had gone through over the past six to eight months. It was all real, I really did consider giving up the game.“
"I was really struggling and anyone who has been through it, will know it’s not easy to stand on a big huge stage in front of thousands of people when you’ve got anxiety."
“I was just hoping that people might have celebrated it a bit. Like this is great he is World Youth Champion but he could have given up the sport eight months ago. But unfortunately it didn’t end up like that. People see the bad instead of the good in you."
Like alluded to he opened up on his anxiety last year and he reflected on that decision and what he has had to go through as a result.
“Being truthfully honest I do think that opening up about there anxiety has made me stronger. In my opinion if I can fight through this, I can fight through anything. It’s really not been an easy time for me over the past 12 months," he continued.
“I never thought at my age I’d have to go through something like this. But life can throw up anything, everyone knows that."