Ryan Meikle (#64 FRH, 89.37 (#50), 289-310 (48.25%, #76))
Fallon Sherrock (#109 FRH, 86.04 (#79), 6-11 (35.29%, #93))
What a fantastic full debut season it's been for Luke. What hasn't been said already isn't really worth saying, but sufficed to say he's exceeded all expectations in terms of how he would cope with a full time schedule against the best players in the world and how he would handle it. First Pro Tour event - won. First Euro Tour - won. First World Series event entered - won. He's won the Premier League, the World Series finals, it took maybe a little bit longer than expected to get the first major (that's ranked at least, not that I class unranked stuff as major titles), having to wait until the Grand Slam to get it, but by the time we'd got half way through the season, any doubters as to whether Littler's world run was a bit of a fluke, which would have been naive at the time, we knew it was a case of when, rather than if, he'd bink a big one. He's handled the schedule well, only playing about half the Pro Tour events, where he binked another two after that first win, as well as getting a second Euro Tour. There's not too much that can be said that is disappointing - it looked like the first major could have come at the UK Open, but Heta played out of his skin to just get home. A draw of van Gerwen in the Matchplay was about as hard as it could have got, at the Grand Prix he got one of the players that could step up to realistically challenge in Rob Cross and he did so, I guess the only disappointing result would have been the loss to Andrew Gilding at the European Championship, given after that he did get the major win, then only lose to Humphries in the next final. Pick any metric you like and Luke will be in the top two or three in the world, it's just a shame that a possible (probable?) world final rematch would only take place at the semi final stage this time around.
Meikle has been floating around that top 64 position for what seems quite a while now, and while he's on the right side of the cutoff for now, it's not by much and he could definitely use a first round win to make things secure. He is known to have a very good top level game, but 2024 seems to have been a bit of a struggle for form, although his numbers appear a bit better than his results. On the floor, he got to an early quarter final back in April, and would win his board on another couple of occasions, including right at the final weekend where without that, he might have been in some danger of missing Minehead if things fell unkindly (or even the worlds, which would have been a disaster). There were a few spots on the European Tour where Ryan appeared, but he would make two events and then get called up to a third as an alternate. He didn't win a game however, the first two against higher ranked players so fair enough, but in the last one he lost to a pretty much unknown Swiss qualifier 6-5 where neither averaged 75. His only TV this year was the two Minehead events, where he did well for himself - at the UK Open, he came through Geert Nentjes and Brett Claydon but would then lose heavily to Keane Barry, while his best win of the season would come in the PC Finals where he shockingly beat Gary Anderson out of almost nowhere, and nearly went one further but lost narrowly to Schindler in the second round. That win showed the peak game we know he has, but to me he looked a bit slower and more deliberate than what I remember, which may possibly not be helping him - although it worked that time. He'll need that sort of game to get beyond round two here.
Sherrock comes back for a fifth appearance, but has never really come close to the feats she managed on that first appearance, and I think has been somewhat unfairly hyped up beyond her station and will continue to have that sort of publicity, rather than just being allowed to concentrate on the darts. This season has been moderately quiet to be honest - the only data I have is from last year's first round defeat to Jermaine Wattimena, at least in the database. We can look at the Women's Series, there she was a distant second to Beau in the averages, and third in the overall standings behind van Leuven, ending up with three wins and three runners up positions. That average of 82 is likely deflated due to standard of competition, but the first nine makes the case that she'd need six visits to finish way more often than not. The 87 she averaged in the women's Matchplay final (where she lost to Greaves) and the typical 85-88 sorts of numbers she managed in her floor finals against Greaves may be more representative if trying to compare to Meikle. She did play a couple of the Challenge Tour weekends (more in 2025 please) and get a few good starts, but wasn't able to get beyond the last sixteen, which she reached only once, picking up some scalps such as new Lakeside champion Shane McGuirk and a fine 5-0 over Andy Boulton, but the majority of wins were over obscure names even at Challenge Tour level. We don't even have much to go at in the WDF, with some wins back in January in Vegas and then one up in Scotland a month later, but she's not even ranked in the top 16 in their system now.
Meikle against Sherrock is one that I would expect a newly confident Meikle to win, but he could easily be knocked off stride by what I would expect to be a partizan crowd, so if Fallon plays some of her better stuff, then it could get interesting and maybe give Sky their dream matchup. Littler easily swats aside either of these of course, although that Meikle is projecting around 20% does surprise me, I'd have guessed lower.
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