Teenage sensation Luke Littler continued his historic World Darts Championship journey by downing hero Raymond van Barneveld to reach the quarter-finals.
The 16-year-old has set the Alexandra Palace tournament alight on debut and is the youngest player ever to reach the last eight after a stunning 4-1 win.
He showed maturity and talent way beyond his tender years to get past the five-time world champion, who he used to imitate in front of the television as a three-year-old.
He peppered the treble 20 nine times and finished with an emphatic average of 105.01.
Littler, who has made the world sit up and take notice, will come back on New Year's Day for a winnable quarter-final tie against Brendan Dolan and will be dreaming of going all the way.
SENSATIONAL LITTLER DOES IT AGAIN!! 🤯
— PDC Darts (@OfficialPDC) December 30, 2023
A truly incredible performance from Luke Littler as he DEMOLISHES his darting idol Raymond van Barneveld 4-1.
Simply breathtaking from the 16-year-old who storms into the Quarter Finals!
📺 https://t.co/f3RU9WTIoD#WCDarts | R4 pic.twitter.com/HI0vHux223
Life has changed immeasurably since 'The Nuke' came into the tournament on the back of winning the World Youth Championship last month.
He is now a recognisable name and has enjoyed celebrity status after bursting on to the scenes with wins over Christian Kist, Andrew Gilding and Matt Campbell.
Littler and his family received complimentary tickets to watch Arsenal in the Premier League on Thursday night, while players from his beloved Manchester United sent him good luck messages before the match.
He has catapulted himself into the mainstream and whatever happens between now and Wednesday's final, it will be Littler's journey that is the talking point of the tournament.
He was not even born when Van Barneveld won the last of his five titles.
Video footage has emerged of a three-year-old Littler copying 'Barney's' celebration and has admitted it was a dream to play him on the Ally Pally stage.
Littler enjoyed Van Barneveld's famous walk-on as much as the raucous crowd, but soon got down to business, throwing a maximum on just his second visit and raced to the first set after an 11-dart leg.
He continued to dominate and went 3-0 up before moving one leg from dreamland.
Van Barneveld made him work hard for it by winning the next leg, but nothing was going to stop the teenager in the next set as the apprentice beat the master in style.
Next up is Dolan, who beat his second former world champion in three days when he ousted Gary Anderson 4-3.
It looked like the Northern Irishman, who dumped out Gerwyn Price in the third round, was heading out as Anderson rallied from 2-0 down to lead 3-2. But Dolan composed himself and won the final two sets to reach the last eight.
"I'm over the moon," he said. "I just think so much of Gary and how brilliant he is. It is not a bad couple of days. There has certain things that have happened that maybe make me think it's meant to be."
Pre-tournament favourite Luke Humphries again survived a scare as he prevailed in an epic thriller with Joe Cullen, winning a sudden death leg in the final set.
The pair were locked at three sets all and five legs all, with Humphries taking out 100 to win on his 10th match dart.
"It was one of the best games I have ever been apart of. Every time I looked around it was just treble after treble. No one deserved to lose, Joe did not deserve to lose that," Humphries said.
