There are good days in a sporting life, there are great days… and then there are the days where the universe steps in, straightens your tie, pats you on the back and says: This one’s for the mantelpiece.
Luke Humphries just had one of those days.
Windsor Castle — all stone, ceremony and centuries of weight — played host to the man who only twelve months ago was conquering a very different palace. Not Buckingham. Not one with crown jewels. The one with plastic cups, Viking helmets, and a thousand drunken Santas screaming his name as he sat proudly on the darting throne at Alexandra Palace. But today belonged to a different kind of royalty.
Today, Luke Humphries collected three letters that will follow his name for the rest of his life: MBE.
In the grand halls of Windsor, the Prince of Wales himself handed him the honour — a surreal moment for a lad from Newbury who has battled mental demons to reach the pinnacle in his chosen field.
“It was a massive privilege and honour to receive my MBE from the Prince of Wales today,” Humphries reflected afterward, still glowing like someone who’d just thrown nine perfect darts across the Royal lawns. And if it looked emotional, that’s because it was.
“This is a great achievement for me and my family, and I couldn’t have achieved this without them.”
The Humphries clan have lived every moment with him — the early mornings, the youth events, the heartbreaking losses, the meteoric rise, the world-title coronation. Today wasn’t just his; it belonged to the whole crew.
This wasn’t some symbolic pat on the head, a ceremonial nod to a “nice lad doing well.” Cool Hand earned this with a run of form that may go down as the most sustained period of excellence since Phil Taylor was industrialising world titles. He didn’t just win. He reshaped the landscape.
The world first took proper notice when he lifted the 2019 World Youth Championship. The win said “future star.” Few realised it actually meant “incoming era.” Then came the breakthrough — the 2023 World Grand Prix — the trophy that cracked open the dam. After that, the flood arrived: Grand Slam of Darts, Players Championship Finals, TV title after TV title, until finally, inevitably, unavoidably, he climbed onto darts’ most coveted throne.
January 2024. Alexandra Palace. A record-breaking final against Luke Littler that felt less like a match and more like the start of a rivalry Sky Sports executives will be dining out on for the next decade. Humphries won. Emphatically. Clinically. Historically. The Sid Waddell Trophy didn’t have to be engraved — it practically wrote his name on itself. And he didn’t stop there. World Matchplay. World Cup of Darts. Another Players Championship Finals crown. The World Masters. And then the Premier League in May 2025, delivered with the icy smile of a man who now expects to win things that terrify everyone else.
“I’m very grateful for the platform I get as a professional darts player, and I’m very proud to have made such an impact and receive such a prestigious award.” Prestigious doesn’t even cut it. He is now officially part of the national record — a player honoured not just for winning, but for elevating the entire sport.
Barely hours after leaving Windsor Castle, the conversation shifts back to the only palace that really matters in December. The 2025/26 Paddy Power World Darts Championship. The one with the £1 million jackpot. The one where legends are minted and forgotten, often in the space of minutes. Humphries enters this edition not as a plucky ex-champion, but as a man carrying an MBE in his luggage and a target on his back. The 128-player field is swollen with storylines, hopefuls and hungry newcomers, but one truth remains: when Cool Hand gets his engine going, the rest of them look like extras in his documentary.
He’ll begin his title charge on December 13th, taking on Ted Evetts — a battle between two former World Youth Champions whose careers have taken wildly different trajectories. Humphries will walk into Ally Pally not as the lad who dreamed of the big stage… but as a man who has conquered it, owned it, and returned to defend it with royal approval.
And somewhere in a drawer at home, Luke will probably open it three times before bed just to check it’s real, is the medal that says the country agrees. Luke Humphries, MBE. King once. Knighted by the public. Honoured by the Palace. And now he marches back to the palace of darting dreams… ready to prove the crown still fits.
—–ENDS—–
Images: PA MEDIA
