Liam Pitchford is in a class of his own as he prepares for his fourth Olympic Games

Liam Pitchford will push the boundaries for British table tennis this summer in Paris by becoming the first player to represent the British team at four Olympic Games.

Carl Prean and Paul Drinkhall, the latter with Liam in London, Rio and Tokyo, have been to three Games but are now outshone by Pitchford.

Not that achieving it was as easy as he had hoped. He had enough points in the bag to qualify for the world rankings, fuelled by reaching the final of the WTT Contender Muscat last autumn and performing well at the WTT Champions Frankfurt shortly afterwards, but a recent shoulder injury meant it was still an anxious wait.

I am overjoyed to finally be officially selected, said the man from Chesterfield. I knew I had a lot of points going into the rankings. With the injury and not playing the qualification (the European singles qualification tournament), I was still confident that I would be accepted.

It's clearly not the way I wanted to approach the Games. I would rather have a few tournaments under my belt, at least in the weeks leading up to it.

I had an injection a few weeks ago and that helped calm it down. I went to see the specialists and we put together a program to get me back on the table.

I did the work I had to do and when I got back to the table I felt good. I was hungry to go.

The last couple of months have been really tough, coming back from an injury, but I feel in good shape. I've done a lot of rehab off the table and in the gym, and I've been back on the table for a couple of weeks now and I'm feeling good. So yeah, I'm excited to get out there.

While the lack of tournament preparation is not ideal, high quality training is available at the Elite Training Centre in Sheffield, the new performance base.

I thought about playing Tunisia (last month's WTT competition), but it made more sense to have another training block and not waste time travelling and flying everywhere, risking another flare-up or something, he said.

It was tough, the training, but it was fun. It's a good environment we have in Sheffield now. Everyone's training hard, working hard.

Obviously I don't really know what to expect going there without having competed for three months, but at the moment I'm feeling good in training and I'm really happy with where I'm at.

What would 12-year-old Liam have thought if someone had told him he would be competing in four Olympic Games?

He probably wouldn't have believed you, Liam said. I'm not even sure I took table tennis seriously at that age, so I probably didn't expect it. But once I chose table tennis and wanted to do it, it was always my dream, to be an Olympian and win Olympic medals.

It's been a while since we were in London. Tokyo has been a bit different with Covid times so I'm looking forward to being in the Olympic Village, back to normality. And with Team GB it's an amazing experience so I'm looking forward to it again.

I am still hungry to get results and win medals. I am not going to say it is impossible, because I really do not believe it is impossible. I think that everything is possible if I am in good shape and feel good and am in the right place.

I probably haven't felt this good in a long time. I'm happy and I'll see what happens.

Liam was encouraged by his family in London and he also receives support in Paris.

He said: I think my mum and my sister are coming, so that will be nice. Most of my family came to London when I was there to watch me play. It's a bit further from home, but not too far, so I think there will be a lot of fans from Britain. I think apart from France we're probably the biggest ticket buyers, so it will be almost like home games.

Liam turned 19 just a few days before his debut in London. He is about a year older than his teammate Anna Hursey, who is making her debut at the Olympic Games in Paris. How will he help her cope with all the hustle and bustle of the Games?

I'll just try to encourage her, and also encourage her to experience the village and what it brings, as part of team GB. It can be a daunting place for someone so young. But I hope she just embraces it.

She is an incredible talent, to qualify like she did at 17 I had a host country spot, to do what she has done is quite remarkable and I think she will only get better.