Allen magnanimous after surprise exit

Published Wednesday, 28 March 2012

Antrim snooker player Mark Allen has fallen at the first hurdle in the China Open, suffering an unexpected defeat at the hands of Ricky Walden in Beijing.

Northern Ireland's Mark Allen in action. (© Getty)

Despite the match coming after Allen's World Open victory in Haikou earlier this month, he lost out 5-2 to Walden - exiting the tournament after the first round for the second year running.

Given Allen's exit, Walden now faces Stephen Maguire in the next round.

That didn't go as planned. Poor performance and some costly errors at wrong time. All credit to Ricky. He played solid. Good luck to him
— Mark Allen (@pistol147) March 28, 2012

Writing on the social networking site Twitter, Allen simply put his defeat down to his own "poor performance" and wished Walden luck.

Also progressing are current world champion John Higgins, Mark Williams and Stuart Bingham, while three-time world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan will be looking for a win against Marcus Campbell - who defeated Allen last year - in his first round game on Wednesday.