Liam Pitchford heads into the Europe Top 16, which starts on Saturday, looking to go one better than his memorable run to the semi-finals last year.

After getting through the opening round against Tomislav Pucar, Pitchford defeated No 1 seed Truls Moregard in the quarter-finals (pictured above), coming from 3-1 down, to set up a semi-final against European champion Dang Qiu of Germany.

He was beaten 11-8 in the deciding game of a thrilling match and had to settle for a bronze medal – his best performance at the annual event, held in Montreux, Switzerland.

The English No 1 is ranked ninth of the field this time and will find out his opponent in the draw on Friday evening – he will face one of the top-eight athletes in the first round.

Follow the competition live on ETTU.TV

Pitchford said: “I’m looking forward to playing it again, it’s one of the best tournaments of the year, in regards to organisation, hall and playing system.

“I really enjoyed it last year, obviously I had a good result and I’m hoping to equal that or go further but it’s obviously going to be tough, I’ll be playing a top-eight seed first match, so it’s not easy.

“But it’s another chance to play against these guys and I’m feeling good.”

The full list of entries is:

1 Felix Lebrun (FRA), 2 Dimitrij Ovtcharov (GER), 3 Dang Qiu (GER), 4 Darko Jorgic (SLO), 5 Anton Kallberg (SWE), 6 Marcos Freitas (POR), 7 Truls Moregard (SWE), 8 Alexis Lebrun (FRA), 9 Liam Pitchford (ENG), 10 Jonathan Groth (DEN), 11 Anders Lind (DEN), 12 Joao Geraldo (POR), 13 Alvaro Robles (ESP), 14 Tomislav Pucar (CRO), 15 Yaroslav Zhmudenko (UKR), 16 Loic Stoll (SUI).