A current WWE champion has urged PDC World Champion Luke Littler to embrace being a heel after a recent spat with fans.
January 3 saw Luke Littler achieve a rare feat in becoming a back-to-back PDC World Champion, making him the first man to win two PDC World Titles in a row since Gary Anderson in 2015 and 2016 – something only Littler, Anderson, Phil Taylor (who actually did it several times including one run of winning eight in a row) and Adrian Lewis have ever done.
However, Littler’s run to the title had a couple of hurdles – not necessarily on the dartboard, but more so in his reception from the crowd.
Littler has dominated the sport since his arrival to the PDC tour a couple of years ago, which has led to fans often getting behind his opponents in the hope of seeing an upset.
Littler responded to the Alexandra Palace crowd with something of an outburst after his fourth round 4-2 win against Rob Cross, saying in a live on-stage post-match interview:
“I’m not bothered. Really, I’m not bothered. Really not bothered. Can I just say one thing? You guys pay for tickets – you’re paying for my prize money, so thank you. Thank you for my money. Thank you for booing me. Thank you.”
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There were slight boos for Littler during his walk-on for his next match – the quarter final against Krzysztof Ratajski that Littler won 5-0 – but no real lasting effect.
Littler went on to win his semi-final against Ryan Searle 6-1 and then beat Gian Van Veen 7-1 in the final to become 2026 and back-to-back PDC World Champion, earning him £1 million in prize money.
In a recent interview with SportBible, Undisputed WWE Champion Drew McIntyre encouraged Littler to “go to the dark side” and lean into being a heel as it would help grow the sport of darts.
McIntyre said:
“Eventually if you just keep winning, winning and winning people get bored of it and then he’s probably getting some of the stick that’s getting to him.
“So lean into it. Start saying how you feel. As long as you keep the performances and the victories going – you have to win when you talk that much trash.
“More people are going to show up, it’s going to generate interest for darts. If he starts leaning into that and running his mouth like he did in that one interview after the crowd were giving him a bit of stick, that’s what makes attendances grow.
“If you look at Cassius Clay or Muhammad Ali, people think they loved him all the time. They hated him and they paid to see him lose but he was too good.
“You look at a Logan Paul today, people just want to see that guy lose. People pay extra money for heels, it’s boring eventually if the good guy wins all the time.
“I’m excited to see him go to the dark side and get the numbers up. There’s a fine line between love and hate and when he turns good again it’ll be even better in the future. Everything is wrestling.”
Since he retained his World Championship at the start of the year, Littler has already gone on to win the Saudi Arabia Darts Masters, and this past weekend won one of the very few big TV titles he hadn’t yet picked up, the Winmau World Masters, beating Luke Humphries in a deciding set 6-5.
McIntyre was also successful in Saudi Arabia recently, retaining the Undisputed WWE Championship against Sami Zayn this past weekend, and then showing up later in the night to eliminate Cody Rhodes from the Royal Rumble match.
Littler has had crossovers with WWE in the past, including in 2024 when he and fellow two-time PDC World Champion Peter Wright filmed content with William Regal and Pretty Deadly at WWE HQ, with Littler using Cody Rhodes’ entrance theme for his walk-on at the US Darts Masters that year.
Outside of using Rhodes’ theme for that tournament, Littler uses Pitbull’s Greenlight for his walk-ons due to it being the theme song for WrestleMania 33 in 2017, which he attended.
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