It’s fair to say that Mark Allen is one of the hottest properties in the snooker world right now. He’s just dramatically won the UK Championship title, and already people are talking about what’s next. But Allen hasn’t always had it all his own way, battling many trials and tribulations, which made victory in York even sweeter.
For anyone betting on snooker tournaments online, it’s more than likely, they wouldn’t have picked out Allen as the eventual winner of the UK Championship when the action kicked off, with many favouring Ronnie O’Sullivan, especially when he turned in a 6-0 whitewash during the competition. And, during the final against Ding Junhui, who beat O’Sullivan 6-0 en route, Allen was 6-1 down, and people were writing him off. But, out of nowhere came an unbelievable recovery from the Northern Irishman, winning the tie 10-7 and lifting the title.
You can look at Allen’s recovery and suggest he showed true resilience to make it happen. And he did. But these are qualities that he’s previously demonstrated and, more crucially, away from the snooker table. You see, long before his remarkable turnaround in the UK Championship final against Junhui at York’s Barbican Centre, the Belfast-born current world number five has had to revive much bigger things, such as his life and its direction of travel.
If you head back to January 2021, Allen faced the biggest test of his life when he was forced into declaring himself bankrupt. It’s not something he’s unwilling to talk about, as he’s discussed how, after pocketing an impressive £3.5 million across his snooker career up to that point, he’d ‘overspent in every aspect of his life.’ And, factoring in a messy divorce from his now ex-wife, which saw him paying out a lot of money in legal costs, you can see how he ended up in such a desperate situation.
But, you could say that the positives to take from that tough period of his life are what he’s put to work in his snooker career, and he’s already reaping the rewards less than two years down the line. Thirty-six-year-old Allen has long been tipped for big things in the sport, with greats from his country, such as Dennis Taylor and Alex Higgins, the players he was aiming to get somewhere near in terms of success. And while he’s not at those heights yet, he’s beginning to move in the right direction.
It’s going to take a huge amount of effort, and some luck, to fulfil his potential after many years of not living up to expectations. But, with a couple of Triple Crown titles under his belt, a recent UK Championship win, and a climb in the rankings, things are looking promising once again. And, at thirty-six, there is still plenty of time for him to mix it at the top of the sport with the very best and to come out on top, as he’s proven himself capable of doing already.