Martin Gould made it to the third round of the Northern Ireland open with a convincing 4-1 victory over Rory McLeod.

The Pinner snooker star made a break of over 50 in every frame of the match to comfortably win the second round tie and continue his progression in the tournament.

He reached the second round with a 4-0 win over Jamie Clarke to make amends for last week’s first round defeat against Ding Junhui in the German Masters qualifiers.

Gould improved as the behind closed doors contest went on and crafted breaks of 61, 85 and 117 in consecutive frames to book his place in the last 64.

The evergreen Gould, also a talented darts player, took a scrappy first frame after racking up 96 points against the world No.92.

But he then started to hit the straps that saw him win the 2016 German Masters as those two half century visits, followed by 117, blew his opponent away at Milton Keynes’ Marshall Arena.

Gould reached the second round of the World Championship in June and has endured a bumpy ride since the busy snooker circuit resumed after lockdown. He reached the final of the European Masters in the first full ranking event of the season – losing a 9-8 thriller against three-time world champion Mark Selby – but slumped to a shock first round defeat at the English Open against world No.112 Steven Hallworth.

That result against 14-time ranking event winner Ding then followed but Gould looked back to his best as he took to the table at the second Home Nations event of the campaign.