Luke Littler punished one of his lesser-known rivals with some brutal showboating at the Players Championship finals.The World Champion and newly-crowned No.1 beat Ricardo Pietreczko 10-6 to reach the quarter-finals in Minehead, but not before teaching his rival a lesson.Littler dished out another lesson to Pietreczko as the darts stars resumed their rivalryX: @DartsNow The German famously squared up to Littler back in March 2024 at the Belgian Open over showboating, but Littler brought out more this time around, and said ‘Pikachu’ provoked him into it.Pietreczko had a 3-2 lead and later at 5-5, Littler claimed they had a rather odd exchange on stage.The 18-year-old recalled: “I come back on at 5-5 and before the caller came on stage it was just me and him.“He said, ‘I was only looking forward to getting one leg and now I’ve got five’. I just said to myself, ‘Why? why say that?’“I said to myself, ‘You’re getting it, I’m gonna win this game’, and that’s what I done and that’s why I brought out the showboating.”Pietreczko missed the chance to level things at 6-6, but then Littler flew ahead, and once three clear put on a show.Setting himself up for a ludicrous 121 finish of bull, treble seven, bull, his rival could only smile, unlike last year when he confronted Littler after a similar checkout.Asked if the scenes were provoked by their previous exchange on the oche, Littler suggested it was, but gave some credit to his rival for putting the past behind him.“We were fine,” he began. “I went 3-2 down and then 5-5 after the break we weren’t even back live yet and he said to me, ‘I expected to get one leg and now I’ve got five’.“When he’s saying all them things, you’re a professional darts player, anyone can beat anyone, and he was leading. Littler admits he ‘turned on the showboating’ after his opponent’s attempt to get in the teen’s headGetty“I’ve come back and got the game level and then when he’s saying all of that I’ve just said to myself, ‘You’ve really got to win this game’, so when I got three legs clear that’s when I showboated.“Yeah [the 2024 incident] is squashed now but I just want to win darts, win games, but now he’s said that. “He was pretty happy after I beat him, I thought he would’ve been the same as when I beat him on the Euro Tour, but he wasn’t so fair play to him.”Littler added on another 147 checkout: “I was always planning on doing it, I was trying to leave 147 as much as I could in the game to try and take it out again.“It can’t be anything else but to try and get in my head, but if you try and get in my head I’ll just do what I do, 180s and then I’ll bring out the showboats.“I missed a few doubles and if I hit them I probably would’ve gone two, three or four legs clear, but I didn’t and he took his chance but I just had to get into the lead.”Pietreczko was less Pikachu and more Pikachump as his attempts to put Littler off his game badly backfiredGettyLittler and Pietreczko’s previousIt was in fact a 147 at the Belgian Open in March 2024 which seemed to provoke Pietreczko into confronting Littler.Littler won 7-3 on the night, and during the post-game handshake, the German pulled his English rival in and went face-to-face.Posting on Instagram later, he wrote: “I appreciated him a lot that you can play such a game at such a young age but I hope the arrogance punishes him.”Littler simply added: “No idea what I did wrong, no idea what he said. He said something then don’t do it again.”