Stephen Maguire ended a seven year drought of ranking titles after beating Mark Allen 10-6 in the Tour Championship final Friday night.
The Scotsman, Maguire did not originally qualify for the tournament after finishing ninth in the one-year ranking list. But he stepped in to replace Ding Junhui who is still in China and could not make the trip to Milton Keynes.
By winning, Maguire achieved his biggest career payday of £250,000 after securing the title and consequently winning the Coral Cup.
The Scot saw off the top two ranked players in the world, Neil Robertson and Judd Trump on his way to the final, inside a Marshall Arena with no fans and social distancing measures being implemented.
In 39 year old Maguire’s impressive victory against Judd Trump he made a total of 6 century breaks before beating the current World Champion 9-5.
Runner-up Allen also beat two former World Champions on his way to the final. Beating Shaun Murphy in round one and then demolishing three-time champion Mark Selby in the semi-final 9-2.
The first session of the final was a cagey affair with both players missing chances before going into the break tightly poised at 4-4.
However, in the evening session Maguire pulled away after making a tournament-high 139 break and went on to beat Allen comfortably.
Both players will now look towards next months World Championships which begin on the 31st July in Sheffield.
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