Adam Smith-Neale provided a fine performance Wednesday by throwing a nine-darter at the Tour Card-qualifying tournament for the International Darts Open.
He threw his perfect leg in the final round of the qualifying tournament against Jitse van der Wal. He started the second leg with two 180 scores and then managed to throw the required 141 finish.
Smith-Neale did eventually fall short of qualifying for the main tournament. The match was won 6-5 by Van der Wal after a deciding leg.
Luke Littler shows true colours with five-word statement after James Wade upset
Luke Littler reacted after crashing out of the Players Championship 4 to darts icon James Wade.
Luke Littler crashed out of the Players Championship 4 to James Wade. (Image: Getty)
Luke Littler took to social media to react to his first-round exit at the hands of James Wade in the Players Championship 4 on Tuesday. The teenager lost 6-5 to Wade in Leicester in what was a major upset, but has quickly put the defeat out of his mind already and focused his attention elsewhere.
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Wade, an 11-time PDC major winner, stormed into a two-leg lead with an early break of throw, holding his own in the fifth leg to take a 4-1 advantage over the darts sensation. Littler pegged Wade back at 4-2 and then back-to-back 140s in the seventh leg helped him to his own break before tying at 4-4.
They both held at 5-5 and set up a thrilling deciding leg which Wade had the throw for. He backed up a 140 with 138 to leave 10 for the match, which he took out to seal a surprising win over Littler and send the World Championship finalist out in the first round.
Wade could not progress any further, however, and was defeated 6-4 by Czech star Adam Gawlas in the next round.
But it does not appear that Littler will dwell on his exit for too long and has already explained to his fans on social media how he would spend the rest of the day. The 17-year-old was planning for a late run in the tournament but instead was able to take the time for his second hobby, video games.
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James Wade claimed a surprise win over Luke Littler at the Players Championship 4. (Image: Getty)
Reacting to a post on Facebook confirming Littler’s loss, he wrote: “Xbox all day it is” accompanied by a smiling emoji. The comment indicated that he is not too frustrated and will commiserate likely by playing FIFA and then focusing on the next task at hand. It is a steely attitude for the young talent.
After his run to the final at Alexandra Palace, Littler admitted that he could not wait to get back to playing Xbox and his daily routine is not indifferent to many boys his age despite his darting success.
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Luke Littler’s Facebook post after losing to James Wade. (Image: Facebook.)
“It is what I have been doing every day – if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it,” he said last month. “At the moment I don’t practice much. I usually do 30 minutes to an hour a day. Some people probably won’t believe it, but if I’m playing against the best, then I’ve got to up my standard.
“I just wake up, play on my Xbox, have some food, have a chuck on the board and go to bed, that’s it.”
He wracked up a whopping £200,000 cash prize at Ally Pally, since pocketing even more after success at the Bahrain Masters and the Premier League, with that money going back into video games.
“I always treat myself to some Under Armour tracksuits,” he admitted. “And just get myself a new coat and get myself some FIFA points for my Xbox. That’s pretty much it.”
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