World Championship snooker protest: Joe Perry in a 'state of shock' when match with Robert Milkins disrupted

Joe Perry says he was in a «state of shock» as protesters stormed the Crucible during his first-round World Championship match with Robert Milkins. Perry and Milkins had just begun proceedings on table one when a protester emerged from the crowd and unloaded a bag of orange powder onto the baize.

Ad The man — and his fellow female accomplice who had tried to disrupt the action on table two — were swiftly escorted from the arena, but table one had been rendered completely unplayable. World Championship'I'm not going to argue with you, big man!' — Higgins jokes with Grace over break-off2 HOURS AGO Perry and Milkins, after being offered a number of options over when and how to resume the match, subsequently agreed to restart their encounter on Tuesday night.

«It was just a moment of madness wasn't it?,» Perry told Eurosport's Rachel Casey. «You're concentrating so much on the game, I think at the time Rob [Milkins] had just made a foul and I was walking to the table hoping to get my first chance.

Exclusive: 'Completely crazy!' — Allen reacts to protesters halting match Williams listens and laughs as Vafaei ramps up feud with O'Sullivan »And all of a sudden...shock, someone jumped over the barrier, in seconds he was on the table and the table was covered in orange powder stuff, so state of shock really. «I thought I'd seen everything really, but apparently not.» Expanding on the ensuing conversation with the tour director around his now-amended schedule, Perry added: «We were both a little bit shaken up, so we decided to scrap [playing after the Mark Allen match on Monday night], and we're going to play the first session tonight [Tuesday], and then come back Thursday morning.