Canadian Bill Werbeniuk scored the championship's highest , a 143, in his first-round match. There were 14 century breaks compiled during the championship, with ten more in qualifying matches. This was the first professional snooker championship to introduce a ban on performance-enhancing substances, with all players in the main stage having to undertake drug tests. The final between Davis and Taylor holds the record for the most-viewed broadcast in the United Kingdom of a programme shown after midnight, with a peak of 18.5 million viewers for the match's final frame, breaking the existing records for the most-viewed sporting event and BBC2 programme.