Shaun Murphy was chased by two wasps during his Dafabet Masters quarter-final but in the end it was Judd Trump who delivered the sting in the tail.

The Nottingham-based potter spent five minutes trying to avoid the insects in a bizarre scene but he could not avoid being swatted aside by Trump, who progressed to the semi-finals with a 6-4 win.

The Alexandra Palace has been plagued by insects for much of the week with players often swatting away flies but 2015 champion Murphy had bigger problems on his hands and was not impressed after the match.

“I am terrified of wasps. Who isn’t? Who likes wasps? What are they for? Why are they here? Why are they in that room? I have no idea,” he said.

“It is one of the problems of playing in buildings like this with holes everywhere. There is wildlife in this building that perhaps should not be here.

“A lick of paint would not do this building any harm, a bit money spent on it would have that sealed up – we should not have things like that disrupting an indoor sport.”

Murphy will now focus on getting ready for April’s World Championship after he was outclassed by an imperious Trump.

The left-hander, who is attempting to reach his first Masters final, opened up a 4-2 lead before Murphy levelled the score.

But he finished with a flourish, scoring two centuries to book a last-four match with Kyren Wilson.

“I think in the end, it was similar to my first match. Shaun battled back against me but I got over the line,” Trump said.

“The start of the match was very scrappy, we did not play our game and we were very wary of each other but then after five or six frames it picked up and there was some good snooker.”

Elsewhere, John Higgins admits he will be fighting nerves when he walks out to face Mark Allen for a place in the Dafabet Masters final tonight.

The Scottish star looked completely relaxed in his 6-1 semi-final win against Wales’ Ryan Day and, as the only former winner left in the draw, he is the new favourite to win snooker’s second biggest tournament.

But the Wizard of Wishaw is no longer a regular in the final stages of the biggest tournaments and it no longer comes naturally to him to perform when the spotlight is on.

“Mark has not been in the semi-finals of the big TV events so I am hoping experience will play a part but neither have I lately,” he said.

“I got to the final of the World Championships and that is it really in the last six or seven years so I am going to be really feeling the nerves.

“Mark is a great player and I have a lot of respect for him because he is a great player. We always have some great matches and I know he will raise his game so I will have to too.

“Mark is fancying it now, he has beaten the main guy, he has beaten O’Sullivan, so he will be really up for it.”

Watch the London Masters LIVE on Eurosport and Eurosport Player with Colin Murray and analysis from Neil Robertson, Jimmy White and Neal Foulds.