Allen and Gould suffer early Sheffield exits

MARK ALLEN and Martin Gould became the first seeds to bite the dust in the first round of the Betfred.com World Championship on Sunday afternoon.

Gould was unable to recover from a poor opening session as he was beaten 10-8 by David Gilbert, who had been 5-2 at the start of the match.

However, Allen’s 10-6 exit at the hands of  Cao Yupeng was an even bigger shock as the Chinese debutant had been available at 11-2.

Allen remained just 4-11 prior to Sunday’s session despite trailing 5-4, but the sloppy play that had afflicted him the previous evening continued while Cao grew in confidence and hit two centuries.

The match ended in bizarre fashion as Allen appeared to have cleared up to pull the score back to 9-7 only to see the cue ball go in after potting the black.

Read Monday's Racing Post for latest Betfred.com World Championship first-round betting verdicts and prices