Luke Littler’s bland entourage

Luke ‘The Nuke’ Littler, born two weeks after the first iPhone was unveiled, stormed the Professional Darts Corporation world championships last week to become, at 17, the sport’s youngest ever world champion. How Littler behaved after his win shows how different young sports stars are today. Littler didn’t celebrate by going out drinking; no hotel rooms were trashed. Instead, within hours of his quarter- and semi-final victories, he was on the video-game streaming website Twitch via phone call to his red-headed gaming friend Morgan Burtwistle – known online as ‘AngryGinge’.

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AngryGinge, 23, is one of the UK’s most popular streamers, with around four million followers across Twitch, YouTube and TikTok. Twitch allows you to observe the lives of men who spend most of their time in their bedrooms. AngryGinge’s fans can watch him playing video games, commenting on Premier League football matches and playing darts against himself – all in real time. It’s a serious profession for Morgan: he’s estimated to make up to £40,000 a month from Twitch and a similar amount from his YouTube channel, along with money from other social media platforms.

Ginge’s connection to Littler comes through his virtual football team, ‘GirthNTurf’. Littler occasionally plays in matches (on a multiplayer version of the Fifa football game), and their gameplay and banter are streamed to Ginge’s thousands of avid viewers. These streams are often tagged as ‘ADHD’, which appears to be seen as a personality type within Gen Z.