Luke Littler began his quest of completing the clean sweep of major honours with an opening win over Willie O'Connor at the Machineseeker European Championship on Friday night in Germany. Littler is in Dortmund, trying to win the only big event he has yet to claim in a dominant first two years on the scene. He got off to a good start on Friday night with a 6-3 win over O'Connor, with six 180s to set up a second-round clash with Nathan Aspinall.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player The teenager is set to take part in a huge Netflix show next week where 24 players are vying to win £501,000 by beating him in a one-off leg, and asked whether his focus is on this tournament, he said: "This is the next one after the World Youths, so I knew how much time I would have off. "Obviously, (I've played) a few exhibitions, but yeah, just obviously been chilling out, practicing, and this is the one I really want." The 19-year-old has not played since a surprise defeat in the World Youth Championship and has enjoyed the break. "I think I'm more focused because of the amount of time we've had off," he added.
"I mean, I have not been doing too much, but I've been practising. "I've just got to take it one game at a time, and obviously it's the last one missing, so I can't be putting too much pressure on myself. "I'm just happy to get back on stage and do my job." Littler also revealed he had changed his grip and throw during a lengthy recent lay-off from competitive action to stave off a feeling of boredom in practice.
"I think it's just having so much time off. I had loads of weeks to prepare for this, so I can just go to the practice board at home and just kind of change it, really," he said. "I hit a nine-darter the other night on DartCounter as well, so I was like... 'I think I will stay with this until something does go wrong'.
But it is all going well so far." After Luke Humphries withdrew with illness, Littler's possible path to glory looks even easier as Michael van Gerwen crashed out on Friday night. Van Gerwen is not the player of old and went out 6-3 to Dutch compatriot Kevin Doets. "It was a tough game," assessed Doets, who will take on Krzysztof Ratajski on Saturday evening.
"The draw comes out and I get Michael… it's still Michael van Gerwen. He is the one I looked up to for years and the most successful player from the Netherlands. "He didn't play like he can, but I'm really happy to win.
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