HIS dominance of the world's junior ranks shows no sign of stopping, but teenage table tennis star Paul Drinkhall has admitted that this month's senior World Championships represent one of the toughest tests of his fledgling career.

The Loftus-based 17-year-old maintained his flawless record on the ITTF world junior tour with a gold-medal double at this month's Spanish Youth Open.

Drinkhall, who won the under-18 Award for Sporting Excellence at The Northern Echo's Local Heroes Awards in November, did not lose a single game as he claimed the boys' singles and boys' team titles at Platja D'Aro.

But the stakes will increase considerably when he travels to Zagreb this weekend to take on the best players in the world.

Ranked outside the world's top 150, it would be a major surprise if Drinkhall advanced beyond the opening two or three rounds in the Croatian capital.

But despite suffering a second-round defeat in the senior European Championships this year, the Teessider is confident of a strong showing this month.

"I'm not going into this with my head in the clouds and I know the world seniors is a completely different level to the one that I've been playing at recently," said Drinkhall. "But the top players don't come into the competition until the later rounds, so the first challenge for me is to get that far.

"My main target is to improve my world ranking because, at the moment, I don't really think it's a fair reflection of the level that I'm playing at.

"I'm ranked somewhere about 200 and I'd like to improve that before the end of the month."

Drinkhall's junior success in Spain came just seven days after he completed an intense training programme with leading Chinese duo Chen Weixing and Lin Ju.

The teenager, who has made a number of trips to China in the past, has spent much of this year training alongside leading players from the game's acknowledged powerhouse.

And after he followed up his previous junior success in Canada with a whitewash victory over Japan's Kentaro Muichi in the Spanish final, Drinkhall is confident that his unorthodox training policy is paying dividends.

"Training with Chen Weixing and Lin Ju has helped a great deal," he said. "I've always liked working with Chinese players because I think you can pick up so much from the way that they train and play the game.

"Mentally, they teach you not to lose any easy points, and I think that showed with the way I played in the semi-final and final.

"I didn't feel like I played my best in the team event (where Drinkhall was partnered by Darius Knight), but fortunately we pulled out the big shots when we needed to."