Mark Allen made a 147 maximum break during his third-round match against Ben Mertens at the British Open – where he had said the table should be “burned”.

Allen won a final-frame shootout in his opening match of the tournament against Gary Wilson before describing conditions at the Centaur Arena in Cheltenham as “absolutely embarrassing”, adding “the table needs to be burned”.

The world number three – who later apologised to interviewer Rob Walker on X for his outburst – had comfortably seen off the Republic of Ireland’s Aaron Hill 4-1 in his next match to set up a showdown with Belgian Mertens.

Allen had claimed the opening frame before setting up the fourth perfect clearance of his career, which included a fine double into the middle pocket for the 10th red as he moved 2-0 ahead before closing out a 4-1 win with a 77 break.

Should no-one else equal Allen’s 147 in Cheltenham, he will take home the £5,000 high break prize.

Allen will be back on the table again for the late evening session where he will play Chris Wakelin who beat David Grace 4-2, making a break of 99 in the fourth frame.

There had also been a maximum chance during Thursday afternoon for Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, who missed the 13th red in the first frame of his 4-3 win over Ricky Walden to reach the last 16, where he will play Mark Selby in the late session.

World number one Judd Trump made it 21 wins from 23 matches so far this season with a 4-2 defeat of Mark Davis, while Oliver Lines edged out Sunny Akani 4-3.

John Higgins came through a three-hour all-Scottish clash against Graeme Dott 4-2 and will go on to play Rory Thor, who has already knocked out former world champions Mark Williams and Neil Robertson.

World Champion Kyren Wilson hit breaks of 80 and 95 in his 4-0 win over Marco Fu, while Luca Brecel beat Liam Davies 4-1.