Mark Allen labelled the views of Shaun Murphy as “irrelevant” after the latter called out players for recent criticism of playing conditions.
Not the first time, the pair have been involved in an online tit-for-tat despite being good friends away from the game.
Last week at the British Open in Cheltenham, Allen lambasted how things were set up at the Centaur, and in particular he was aggrieved by the standard of the table.
“The conditions out there are absolutely embarrassing,” the Pistol told Rob Walker on ITV following his 4-3 defeat of Gary Wilson in the first round.
“It’s some of the worst weather outside and they’ve left the massive transport doors open. It’s so cold, it’s so humid out there. The table needs to be burned.”
“The cushions are just unplayable, uncontrollable – it was heavy. The speed was decent, but there’s new guys doing the tables this year, and they’re clearly not up to it.
“I pride myself on preparing properly for tournaments with good conditions. You turn up and you don’t get them. It’s not good enough.”
But Murphy, who is on the WPBSA Players’ Board, came to the defence of tournament organisers and table fitters.
“I must defend the staff,” Shaun Murphy was quoted as saying by the Irish Daily Star at the weekend.
“I think some of the criticism from fellow professionals has been nothing short of rude and amateurish.”
“There’s a real misconception about playing conditions – people either refer to them as good or bad. The truth of the matter is they’re either difficult or more difficult.
“It’s about time players understood that. They’re either difficult or get more difficult with the weather and humidity.
“A lot of players don’t understand that once humidity hits a table, it becomes very difficult.
“It’s nothing to do with the table fitter or their skill. They get a table off the back of a lorry and fit it, they do a great job.
“It’s about time some of our players educated themselves and maybe visit the factory. Maybe they wouldn’t say such silly things.
“Criticising members of staff who are just doing their job – and they do it brilliantly all around the world week in and week out – was a step too far.
“I hope it’s something that we see the back of.”
Allen, who went on to compile a 147 break in one of his subsequent matches at the British Open en route to a spot in the semi-finals, volleyed back on X.
“Anyone taking Shaun Murphy’s opinions seriously, I seriously question their judgement or quite possibly their sanity, not gonna lie,” Mark Allen quipped on the social media platform.
“Anyway, maybe I’ll take three cues to my next match,” the world number three sarcastically added with a couple of laughing emoticons.
When an X user replied that Murphy is entitled to his opinions as a four-time World Championship finalist, Allen responded by insinuating that those views are “irrelevant”.
Murphy expressed in more detail his thoughts on the topic during the latest episode of his podcast with emcee Phil Seymour, released on Monday.
“It was bad. It was difficult,” the Magician admitted on the OneFourSeven Podcast when it came to the playing conditions last week.
“The thing that annoys me is the lack of clarity on word usage, on terminologies, and understanding what a word means. There is a massive lack of educating the public.”
“Ultimately, there is a massive misunderstanding between the pace of the table, the speed at which the cue ball moves around the table.
“Then we have terminologies such as ‘heavy’, which refers to how much spin we can put on the cue ball and how long that spin stays on.
“The tables are heated to reduce humidity. If the humidity rises to a certain level and moisture gets in the cloth, it affects how much spin you can put on the ball.
“It doesn’t necessarily affect the pace at which the ball goes around the table, and that’s not something we’re bothered about.
“After my matches – a lot of people know this – I jump on Instagram and explain the game, have a bit of a debrief with everyone.
“I said this and I got some really nice comments back, people saying ‘thanks’ for explaining that. So we’ll go again to put it out there.
“When we refer to a table being ‘heavy’, what we mean as professional players (is that) when I’ve spun the cue ball at impact, by the time it’s travelled around the table and hit the ball I’m trying to hit, the spin is gone.
“So if I’m trying to screw the cue ball back six feet, it actually only comes back three feet. It makes a massive difference.”
“The staff,” the Shanghai Masters finalist later said, “there’s been a lot of talk that there are new fitters, and a lot of that is true.”
“Their job is to take a table off a lorry on a pallet, and they put the table together. Their job is to put that table together, have it installed, and get them as level as possible.
“That’s what is in their control. How a table plays, whether it’s heavy or not, whether we can spin the ball properly – that’s nothing to do with them.
“Some of the comments and criticisms about the staff, I find extremely distasteful. I thought they were bang out of order. These guys do an immense job.”
Featured photos credit: WST
