Luke Littler begins defence of Belgian Darts Open title with routine victory

Luke Littler averaged nearly 105 as he began the defence of his Belgian Darts Open title with a 6-2 win over Boris Krcmar.

Two days after coming from 5-0 down to beat Gerwyn Price 6-5 to win the latest Premier League round of action in Dublin, Littler had more of a routine evening at the Oktoberhallen in Wieze.

Littler moved 4-0 ahead, taking out double 19 twice, although the two-time world champion did not have it all his own way after missing five match darts in the seventh leg against his Croatian opponent.

He rebounded with back-to-back 180s and while he was unable to finish with a nine-darter, the 19-year-old secured victory with a 104.7 average to set up a last-16 clash against Niels Zonneveld, who edged out last year’s runner-up Mike De Decker 6-5.

World number two Luke Humphries was given a major scare before seeing off Dirk van Duijvenbode 6-4.

Humphries raced into a 4-0 lead but his Dutch rival hit back and missed a dart to level at 5-5, allowing the Englishman to capitalise and close out victory with a 100.25 average.

Michael van Gerwen was also a 6-4 winner against Mickey Mansell while Jonny Clayton had few alarms in beating Sebastian Bialecki.

But James Wade and Stephen Bunting were early casualties as they lost their second-round matches to Cristo Reyes and Andy Baetens respectively.