Mark Allen reveals how ‘good guy’ Ronnie O’Sullivan has helped him away from the snooker table over the past three years

Mark Allen has revealed that Ronnie OSullivan was one of the first people to text him when he was going through a divorce and says the seven-time world champion is “a good guy off the table”.

Allen divorced his wife in 2020 and struggled in the following months, declaring himself bankrupt in 2021.

The weight loss has helped bring about a huge improvement in Allen’s game and he has been the player of the season so far.

“I know I’ve come across Ronnie over the years at the table, but away from the cameras and one-on-one he’s always been really good to me,” Allen told the World Snooker Tour.

Whenever I asked for something, he gave me his time. When I got divorced, he was one of the first players to message me and tell me to call if I needed him.

That tells me more about who he is as a person than how he acts when the cameras are on. I think sometimes he plays to get people talking.

I wasn’t surprised the conversation happened. We sat in his room and talked for 45 minutes to an hour and talked about all kinds of things.

It wasn’t all about snooker, there was a lot about life in general. It was great of him to give me time, especially when he was pushing for a seventh world title. He was also doing his documentary and there weren’t any cameras, which meant we could have a proper chat. He is a good guy from the table.

Weight loss and a return to a positive lifestyle and personal life have helped Allen to the table.

He goes into next week’s Masters, which starts on January 8, as one of the favourites, and feels he now understands the importance of getting the balance right when he’s not there.

“I said 100 percent that I’ve been too dismissive of these things in the past,” he continued. I was perhaps a little too confident in my abilities at the table. It’s not always about that. Sometimes it’s about looking the parts away from snooker, which I’ve neglected.

I won’t make that mistake again because the game has moved on. The standard is so good and you have to find that little bit extra to set yourself apart.

Guys competing to win have done things off the table to keep themselves in shape. That’s what I’m looking into now.

Allen recently enlisted the help of sports psychologist Paul Gaffney and revealed that setting goals has changed his mindset.

On the psychological side, it’s interesting because I’ve never set goals, the 36-year-old continued.

Of course I want to be world champion, all snookers have such goals. I never put it on a pedestal though. Paul has tried to prioritize things more. He wants me to have goals. Things have definitely changed mentally in terms of what I want to do and how I want to get there.

I was always pretty strong mentally, but he has taken me to the next level. It’s okay to come from behind to win matches now and then, but to do it consistently, you have to be very mentally strong. I showed it at the British Championships.

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