EAST Lancs pair Felicity Pickard and Megan Shackleton are among a 16-strong GB table tennis squad that will compete in the IPTT Slovenia Open this week.

With nearly all the world’s top players set to take part including a strong Chinese team the tournament will provide a valuable opportunity for Pickard from Burnley and Todmorden's Shackleton.

“I am really looking forward to competing again against the world class players,” said Pickard. “It will be another great experience for me. Training has been going really well as I feel I learnt a lot in Italy in February and since then I have really focused on the improvements I needed to make. I have been pushing the top players and I would love to convert these close losses into wins but as long as I am constantly learning and enjoying it I know I will play my best table tennis and the wins will come eventually.”

The 21-year-old took time away from competition in 2014 to focus on her training rather than trying to qualify for Rio and has shown the benefit of that since returning to international competition in October last year.

“I hope to try and get into the top eight in the world rankings this year,” she said, “and to do this I will need to beat some world class players. But I know as long as I remain positive and work hard, taking small steps the results will come.”

Shackleton narrowly missed out on the on qualification for Rio but is determined to put the experience she has gained to good use as she is now focused on Tokyo in 2020.

“It’s been hard to miss out on Paralympic qualification,” said the 17-year-old, “As that's what all athletes aim for. However, I feel the experience of qualification year and going through the same training regime as my team-mates who are going to Rio will really benefit me next time around.

"My targets this year are mostly to improve my world ranking as much as possible and to really keep pushing to improve the foundations of my game to make me a stronger player in the future.”

Pickard was announced this week as one of a group of talented young athletes from 30 different sports who have been awarded the first set of Backing The Best awards by Sport England and SportsAid. The programme is backed by £5.5 million of new National Lottery funding and will be delivered by SportsAid, the charity which helps the next generation of British sports stars by giving them financial support and recognition during the critical early stages of their careers. The awards are worth up to £5,000 per year to help cover expensive costs such as travel, accommodation, nutrition and medical bills and athletes must have demonstrated outstanding ability to be eligible for the bursary.

Todmorden table tennis star Megan Shackleton is among a 16-strong GB squad that will compete in the IPTT Slovenia Open next week (May 4-7). With nearly all the world’s top players set to take part including a strong Chinese team the tournament will provide a valuable opportunity for the GB players to test themselves against the competition ahead of the Paralympic Games in September.

“I’m really looking forward to Slovenia,” said Shackleton, “as it’ll be a chance to play against some of 2016’s Paralympians and I’m hoping I can compete well and show what I’ve been working really hard on in training. I’m finding new confidence in things that I felt were much weaker at the beginning of the year - which is always exciting going into a tournament.”