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Watching the two best players in a sport going head-to-head should be exciting. Must-watch television. Cancel all plans in the diary. But right now, in darts, it's anything but.

That was exactly the case on Thursday night. Having won their respective quarter and semi-finals, . The two best players in the world and each of the previous two world champions. Box office entertainment.

Except, barely anyone would've raised an eyebrow. Why? Because it's the sixth time they've met each other already during this year's Premier League, meaning of the 14 nights of action so far, just under half of them would've featured a Humphries vs Littler match-up.

It's something the television broadcasters are happy to lap up. And evidently the players, too. Or at least some of them. During his debrief after Thursday night's win in Leeds, the victorious Humphries hit back at critics who have labelled the current Premier League format as stale.

The 2024 Ally Pally king stated: "Do you want to see the best players in the world playing against each other? Or do you want to wait six months? A lot of people say 'It gets boring', but I love watching the two best players in the world playing against each other."

By contrast, darts star Kim Huybrechts mused: "I don't really like this format. It's lost some of its charm compared to before. Who wants to watch the twentieth meeting between Luke Littler and Michael van Gerwen in just half a year?"

The current format, which sees eight arrowsmiths enter a mini-tournament each week, earning points based on their performance, has been in place since 2022. At the end of the regular season, the four highest-ranked players qualify for the playoffs, where semi-finals and a final are held to determine the annual winner.

It's worth noting that the Premier League, since its inception in 2005 has never had a set format. It's constantly chopped and changed, and even though the latest evolution came just three years ago, it already feels like it's time for a change.

Granted, the Premier League is an exhibition event, so in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter too much. But if the darts chiefs want the big-name clashes to still carry weight, they have become less frequent. After all, where's the excitement in Humphries vs Littler when it's happening every other week?