Tour Championship snooker: Mark Allen completes comeback against John Higgins, Gary Wilson leads Mark Selby

Mark Allen completed an impressive comeback to beat John Higgins 10-7 in the first round at the 2024 Tour Championship in Manchester.

Allen fought back from 4-1 down and finished strongly as he set up a quarter-final showdown with Ding Junhui.

The eight frames of the first session featured moments of quality as both players battled to get the upper hand in the best-of-19 frame clash.

Allen took the opener with a break of 69 before Higgins, who secured the 12th and final spot in the tournament, responded with breaks of 85 and 75 to move ahead. Higgins then came through a scrappy fourth to lead 3-1 at the interval.

Higgins maintained his momentum when play resumed. After calling a foul on himself he nailed two plants in a break of 66 that eventually helped him over the line following Allen’s failed attempt to get a snooker.

Allen struggled for his usual fluency and that was evident again in the sixth frame. A good long red got him among the balls, but his cue ball control was ragged.

Nevertheless, his grittiness shone through as he potted his way out of trouble to keep the break going before making his 40th century of the season and first of the match.

More importantly, that contribution stopped the rot and reduced his deficit to two frames at 4-2.

The Northern Irishman capitalised on the swing in momentum, winning a marathon 56-minute frame to further close the gap with Higgins, before drawing level by taking the final frame.

Allen picked up where he left off in the evening session, taking the ninth frame in one visit. Higgins responded well with a break of 82, levelling the encounter at 5-5.

Play followed the same pattern over the next two fiercely-contested frames, with Allen winning the 11th and Higgins the 12th.

With the battle narrowed down to the best-of-seven frames, Allen took the lead with a 102 break, before securing a two-frame buffer as Higgins failed to pot a pink from distance.

Higgins brought it back to 8-7 with a break of 86 and looked as if he could level the clash again in the 16th frame. But he was penalised by referee Paul Collier for brushing the green with his sleeve, giving Allen the advantage.

Allen did not look back, taking the frame with a break of 93. He then clinched the winner with his third century of the day, setting up a quarter-final clash against Ding.

On the other table in the afternoon session, Gary Wilson was in sublime form as he opened up a 5-3 lead over Mark Selby.

Wilson made breaks of 95, 98, 78 and 101 to put himself in the ascendancy against the four-time world champion, with a place in the quarter-finals to play Zhang Anda up for grabs.

It was Selby who made the better start. The Jester from Leicester won two of the first three frames, which included a break of 85, to lead 2-1 in the all-English clash.

From there, though, he was second best. Wilson made it 1-1 with a break of 95 and then reeled off four frames in a row from 2-1 down to take control.

Crucially, he won a scrappy fifth frame after the break to move 3-2 ahead before breaks of 78 and 101 helped him extend his cushion.

He may yet rue a missed opportunity to take a 6-2 advantage into tomorrow’s session, though.

After Selby got in first and missed a chance he would have been fearing the worst, but he was given a reprieve and took it to trail by just two frames.

Meanwhile, Mark Williams will have a 5-3 advantage over Tom Ford in their second session tomorrow.

The Welshman had quickly raced into a 3-0 lead, with Ford finally off the mark in the fourth frame after a superb run of 114.

Williams regained his three-frame advantage with a break of 76, but Ford responded with 73 and 136 to close the gap to just one frame.

He couldn’t complete the comeback, however, with Williams securing the 5-3 lead after a break of 86 in the eighth frame.