RONNIE O’SULLIVAN urged snooker’s top brass to consider getting a "proper venue” after branding table conditions at York’s UK Championship as "shocking”.

The Rocket beat Leeds’ Peter Lines 6-3 to make the last 32 at the York Barbican but the four-time UK champion pulled no punches in his post-match press conference - lambasting the tournament's 128 player draw format.

O’Sullivan was critical of the four table set-up in the main arena and said: “The tables are playing really shocking. The cushions are just bouncing. They are going on at one mile an hour and coming off at three."

He added: “During the match I was thinking ‘try not to use any cushions’. I am out there thinking ‘I am in the second biggest tournament we play in and I am thinking of not using cushions' and I feel like I am playing down the snooker club not playing to anyone.”

The five-time World Champion added of the practice tables, based at the Novotel in Fishergate: “I don’t know if you have seen the practice tables. You are playing in front of a bar. My mate came in and he just thought it was a joke. He couldn’t believe they were the practice tables for the tournament."

O'Sullivan continued: “I know what they are trying to do - have 128 players. But get a proper venue, get two proper TV tables. It is like asking (Roger) Federer to go and play on court 13 in front of three men and a dog - for Nadal at the French Open to be stuck on an outside court.

“You just don’t do it. You just think about the players a bit more. Especially the top players, who are there to sell your sport.

“You expect them to go out there and play well and the tables are really shocking. Someone needs to be accountable for it and someone needs to do something about it.”

Asked whether it was time to find a new venue for the tournament, O’Sullivan said: “I don’t know. If they can get it right here - It’s about getting it right.

“You can’t cut corners. This obviously isn’t big enough for 128 players. I think they will need a bigger venue - maybe the NEC - somewhere where they can get 20 tables in.

“If you are going to do it like Wimbledon, you have got to have a proper set up if you are talking about the second biggest event.

“It’s either that or don’t enter and shut up. It’s the second biggest event and you want to play. But you want to play in proper conditions and you just hope that they get it right.

“It would be nice to play in a venue where you feel it is right.”

O'Sullivan had considered whether to withdraw before his match with Lines following the broken ankle he suffered while running in an Essex forest.

In obvious discomfort during his 6-2 win over Daniel Wells in the first round, O'Sullivan spent time having physio from specialists at League One Sheffield United and said: "It's not ideal. I feel like a baby that is trying to learn to walk in some ways because of the muscles around it.

"I am not sure whether the foot is going to do what I want it to do. I am just thinking about where I am walking, where I am turning. I am not getting any rhythm, I am not getting any tempo and I am a busy player.

"I have not got my natural flow but I have got a couple of days off and we will have to see how it goes."