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Topics: Darts, Luke Littler
Chris Nee
The current World Darts Champion has dropped out of the top ten in the PDC ProTour Rankings.
Luke Littler claimed the worlds crown in February but has chosen not to play a number of tournaments in 2025 but has won the World Matchplay and UK Open events.
The 18-year-old, who lost the final of the World Series of Darts against Michael van Gerwen on Sunday, has slipped out of the top ten spots in the ProTour Rankings as a result of his more selective approach this year.
According to the PDC: "The PDC ProTour Rankings are based on prize money won in Players Championship events and European Tour events over a rolling 12-month period."
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Littler isn't at risk of any meaningful consequences, as the rankings are used to determine qualification for the World Darts Championship, World Matchplay and World Grand Prix, events that can be qualified for more straightforwardly through the PDC World Rankings.
'The Nuke' is miles clear in second behind Luke Humphries in the main rankings having trousered more than £1.5m in prize money in the relevant two-year period, and is closing on Humphries at the top.
But in ProTour Rankings terms, prize money of £136,500 leaves him in 11th place in the most recent rolling 12-month period.
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Humphries ranks seventh in the ProTour list, with Van Gerwen behind Littler and in 14th despite being third in the world according to the PDC World Rankings.
The ProTour Rankings leader is England's Stephen Bunting, who's picked up a massive amount of prize money in a very lucrative 12 months.
"Bunting leads the way after an impressive year," reports The Sun. "He won the Bahrain Masters and the Nordic Masters to help him to a total prize pot of £192,000.
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"Martin Schindler and Gerwyn Price make up the top three in second and third respectively."
Bunting is ranked fourth in the world overall.
Warrington-born Littler is one of five players to have completed darts' so-called Triple Crown, winning the World Matchplay final in July.
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But the Triple Crown is not an official accolade in the eyes of the PDC and there are no plans for that to change.
"A small number of people have invented a phrase called the Triple Crown," PDC chief executive Matt Porter told Online Darts.
"All you do by categorising some events at one level is relegate other events. If we said events A, B, C and D were at that level, what does that say about events E, F, G and H? That they’re still good, but it doesn’t work when we then go to sell those events."