Mark Allen insists he will take nothing for granted as his bid for the World Championship title begins on Tuesday evening.

The Northern Irishman has yet to lift the title at the Crucible but has enjoyed a productive season to date, adding the International Championship and Scottish Open titles to his Masters crown in 2018.

But a shot at the world title brings its own challenges for a man whose best performance in Sheffield came more than a decade ago when reaching the semi-finals.

Allen reached the last eight last year before being felled by Kyren Wilson but knows he can’t afford anything less than his best when he faces qualifier Zhou Yuelong in his tournament opener.

“It’s the pinnacle of our sport, there’s no question about it, everyone aspires to be the world champion and I’m no different,” he said.

“Coming to the Crucible, it’s special – it gets more and more special every year.

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Media day done. World championships starts 10am. Can’t wait to get started on Tuesday

A post shared by Mark Allen (@thepistol147) on Apr 19, 2019 at 4:20pm PDT

“I feel like I’m in a good place, I took some time off from other competitions and gave myself two extra weeks on the practice table which has really helped.

“Zhou Yuelong is a good opponent, he’s been here once before and lost a close match so I’m going to have to play pretty well.

“I’ve been here quite a few times now so hopefully I can use that experience to my advantage. But if I don’t play well, he’s more than good enough to beat me on any given day, so I can’t take anything for granted when playing a qualifier.

“I’m here to win the World Championship but it starts at round one – everyone wants to be there at the end but if you can’t get past round one then you’re not going to win it.”

  • Watch the World Championship LIVE on Eurosport and Eurosport Player with analysis from Jimmy White and Neal Foulds