World Snooker Championship 2023: Mark Allen trounces Stuart Bingham to reach quarter-finals

Mark Allen ticked off the final frame he needed to reach the World Championship quarter-finals with a 13-4 victory over Stuart Bingham at the Crucible.

The Northern Irishman returned for the third session with a 12-4 advantage and a 68 break in the 17th frame ended any hopes of the unlikeliest of comebacks.

Allen, who is chasing a maiden title in Sheffield, did the damage in the second session with a run of seven straight frames. Bingham stepped up with a gutsy 103 to push the match to another day and avoid the ignominy of avoiding defeat with a session to spare, but could not extend the match beyond the opening frame of Saturday’s finale.

Bingham had an opportunity to sow the smallest seed of doubt in his opponent’s mind but missed an easy red to leave Allen amongst the balls. Allen swept home another half-century – his 13th of the match – to book a meeting with either Neil Robertson or Jak Jones.

Allen has won the UK Championship, Scottish Open and World Grand Prix in a career-best season and will head into the last eight in Sheffield buoyed by his destruction of the 2015 world champion. He has reached the semi-finals just once, in 2009.

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