Familiar foes Luke Humphries and Luke Littler will face off in the final of the 2025 World Grand Prix in Leicester tonight. Humphries reached his third successive final in this competition with a 5-3 win over Danny Noppert, while Littler made light work of Jonny Clayton with a 5-1 victory.

While a case could be made for either player here, it would take a brave man to bet against Littler in his pursuit of what would be a maiden World Grand Prix crown. I think it would be fair to say that ‘The Nuke’ has had the more difficult path to navigate to this year’s final, having already seen off Gian van Veen, Mike De Decker, Gerwyn Price and the aforementioned Clayton. 

Yes, the teenage sensation rode his luck to get past Price on Friday night, however that remarkable comeback further demonstrated his resilience - something that we saw multiple times en route to him lifting the World Matchplay trophy in July.

While Humphries will likely push Littler to his limits tonight, the world number one has enjoyed a relatively soft set of fixtures up until now. What’s more, ‘Cool Hand’ made heavy weather of his semi-final success against Noppert, losing three of the final five sets, so he will have to up his game if he is to pip Littler to the prize. 

Luke Littler has hit the most 180s in each of his last three victories at this year’s World Grand Prix, and he looks well placed to repeat the trick in tonight’s final. The Warrington wonderkid has crashed in a combined total of 24 maximums across his four matches en route to the final, delivering double figure 180 counts against both Gerwyn Price and Jonny Clayton. 

That 180 output has further strengthened Littler’s position at the top of the PDC’s 180 leaderboard, with the world champion now boasting a remarkable return of 710 maximums this calendar year. 

While Humphries is also very adept at filling up the treble 20 bed, he has hit almost 300 fewer 180s than Littler this year (440). Moreover, the two players have contested both the Premier League and New Zealand Darts Masters finals in relatively recent times, with Littler comfortably winning the 180 battle on each occasion (10-5 and 7-3). 

Littler will know that his scoring power will be crucial if he is to get the better of Humphries tonight, so I’m expecting to see the teenage trailblazer rack up a bucket load of 180’s in what will be a gruelling race to six sets.