Darts star Luke Humphries has jokingly unveiled his new nickname after progressing to the semi-finals of the World Grand Prix.
The world No 1 secured a 3-1 victory over Jonny Clayton, although Humphries delivered a nervy performance in front of the crowd in Leicester. The 29-year-old was broken by his Welsh opponent early in the second set after the world champion missed a number of shots at double, before bouncing back with a 146 checkout.
After emerging unscathed from the tricky tie, Humphries was asked by a reporter if he had relinquished his ‘Cool Hand’ tag, to which Humphries confirmed: “Yeah, 1728726876 it’s ‘Lucky Luke’.”
Asked if he had to grind out the result, the Newbury man gave a candid assessment of his performance and admitted he felt the pressure during the match.
“I really did feel that, in the first part of the game, Jonny was the better player,” Humphries said. “I know I won the first set in sort of good fashion. But it’s not about getting nervous, I just feel like I was trying too hard to get this game won.
“You just know there’s another great opportunity to pick up a major and usually when you’ve won so many, you think they’re easier to win. But I do think they’re actually harder to win because you just want to prove everyone wrong, you want to win again and say you’ve got another feather in your cap to win again.
“You still feel a couple of mistakes could cost you, especially double in, so when it goes to first to five in the semis, I’ll embrace that so much more and enjoy it because you can relax. I know I can’t make loads of mistakes but I can relax a lot more.”
Humphries is on course to make another final after a remarkable 12-month period in which he has won titles at the Grand Slam of Darts, Players Championship Finals, World Championships, World Cup and World Matchplay.
During that time, he has learned how to manage his nerves and is confident the issue won’t crop up again when he takes on Ryan Joyce in the last four.
“I’ll be very surprised if I come tomorrow and the nerves are there again,” Humphries added. “Sometimes you just have to allow yourself to have a game where, unfortunately, your nerves just take over.
“I am human, sometimes I’m not a robot and the nerves do take over. But at least I can admit it and say it did affect me in the game.
“A couple of doubles go out and I felt like I was missing by miles to be honest, I was trying so hard to get them in. Usually I’m quite relaxed, it’s just one of those games.
“I don’t think it’ll be the same tomorrow. I’m just going to have double in a bit better than I did tonight.”
