Luke Littler slept through rival's shock World Championship exit as he relishes tournament favourite tag

Luke Littlerhas revealed he was fast asleep when big title rival Luke Humphries was put to bed.

Now the kid knows all eyes are wide open glaring at him as he aims to claim Cool Hand’s crown. Littler and Humphries were tournament favourites at the Ally Pally and the 17-year-old was shocked to wake-up and find his biggest threat was out after losing to Peter Wright. That has just cracked up the expectation and scrutiny on him to make history at the World Championship.

But Littler isn’t fazed as he said: “I’ll be honest, I fell asleep for the whole evening session last [Sunday] night. I think it was like 7 o’clock to about two in the morning. I had a sleep. And then I checked my phone. I checked Instagram, Peter’s won, I was like: Really? Then I just stayed up for a bit and, obviously, I got my head back down.

The spotlight was on both of us coming into it. Now it’s going to be on me. I think there would have been expectations no matter what, even if Luke got through. I think all eyes would still be on me.

“It obviously clears it, but there’s still Nathan Aspinall in the way. I’m expecting him to play very well. I know I can get the better of Nathan, but it’s the quarter-finals of the World Championships, anything can happen.”

Littler has had to scrap to this stage having been tested by Ryan Meikle, Ian White and Ryan Joyce. But he said: “I know I can switch up the gears. I’d like to win comfortably, but it’s the World Championships, it’s not going to happen.

"Winning in these sticky situations, it’s even better because you know you can get out of them. I probably said I was more comfortable last year. Obviously no-one really knew me, playing with absolute freedom. I’d say these last two games I’ve played with a bit of