Littler brushes aside Smith to reach Premier League final

Luke Littler is one win away from becoming the youngest ever major champion in darts after reaching the Premier League final.

The 17-year-old has enjoyed a memorable debut campaign, finishing top of the league phase and bagging four nightly victories.

And he put on a show in front of a record 14,000 fans at the O2 Arena in London to beat Michael Smith 10-5 in the play-offs semi-final.

Littler showed exactly why he has taken the world by storm since bursting on to the scene at the World Championship over Christmas, producing a fine performance against Smith, averaging over 100 and delivering two 100-plus checkouts.

After checking out a 144 to break Smith's throw and take a 3-1 lead there was no looking back and he teased the crowd with the prospect of a nine-dart finish after throwing seven perfect darts in the following leg before missing the treble 19.

A 107 checkout took him 8-4 in front and he was able to see the match out to book a spot in the final against Luke Humphries, who beat Michael van Gerwen 10-5 in the second semi-final.

"All of it was very good, coming into tonight I knew I had the darts straight away and I wanted to go into the break with a decent lead," Littler said.

"They are the big shots you have to take out."