Gavin Mahon / Gavin Mahon / 01 October 2008 / Leave a comment

Betting.betfair.com's newest recruit Gavin Mahon pens the first of his weekly columns looking at life at QPR, the big talking points in The Championship and his expert insight into Saturday's tea time kick-off between Coventry and Southampton.

I signed for QPR back in January and I don't think the club has had a quiet moment since - not that those two facts are related, of course, just the amount of change I've seen at Loftus Road in the space of eight or nine months.

Players have come and gone, managers and coaching staff too and the training ground has been re-vamped as well. It's a case of the new owners really putting their marker down and showing everyone that they mean to run Rangers as a business proposition. And I don't see anything wrong with that. These people are businessmen - and ambitious businessmen as that.

On the pitch, we've got the squad to be up there no question in my mind. There's experienced players here, though, such as myself, who know that a promotion challenge isn't going to succeed or fail in the first few weeks and months of the season, it's about the whole campaign so we're focused on our level of performance as much as the results those performances are getting us right now. We've had a couple of disappointments of late - like the 1-1 draw at home to Blackpool on Tuesday - but nothing to knock us out of our stride.

We've got quite a few good young players to give us a good mix in the squad and I'd keep an eye out for the name Emmanuel Ledesma. He's a 20-year-old left-footed winger we've got on loan from Genoa and he's made a real impact. He likes to cut in from the right and whip balls in or get shots off. I'm not surprised the fans have taken to him quickly.

I saw Barnsley gave a debut to the youngest ever Football League player on Tuesday night, Reuben Noble-Lazarus. Fifteen years and 45 days - that's young by anyone's standards!

When you're that young, you are genuinely fearless. Premiership or Championship opposition, it all comes the same to you at that age and I think, as long as Barnsley don't use him too often this year, he'll be fine.

There's an old saying about being old enough if you're good enough and I agree with that, provided it's managed in the right way. As a 15-year-old at Wolves under Graham Taylor, I loved joining in with the first-team training and I remember playing a few reserve games with the likes of John De Wolf and Tony Daley. I was enjoying that, not getting fazed at all.

Take the likes of Tom Huddlestone at Derby County, They put him in as a 16-year-old and why wouldn't you, because he already had that great physique about him. It's a judgement call for the manager at the time, but age shouldn't be too much of a factor.

Coventry City v Southampton, Sky Sports 1, Sat Oct 4, 5.20pm

Every week Betting.betfair.com's regular Premiership previewer Richard Walker chats to Gavin about the biggest of the weekend televised matches in The Championship and recommends a couple of bets based on Gavin's insight into the match.

Gavin says:

"After our game at Birmingham City on TV on Saturday lunch-time, the other live Championship game on Sky Sports is Southampton's youngsters away at Coventry - and we've played both of these sides already.

Southampton really have adopted something of a total football mentality. I'm sure it's great to watch but there's going to be times they need to mix it up physically a little bit and I worry they may not have what they need at their disposal to do that.

The lad who impressed me most for them was Adam Lallana, definitely one of the best players we've come up against this season. His movement was exceptional for a 20-year-old. He comes in off the right side, he's got a low centre of gravity and two good feet. I think they've got a real gem for the future there, if they can keep hold of him.

Coventry beat us 1-0 at their place but we dominated possession. They were set up for a more physical approach, which is more typical of clubs in this division, and have got the players to do it that way.

Mind you, with Freddy Eastwood and Leon McKenzie around, they've got the guys to exploit chances from second balls created by pressure.

The Ricoh's quite a big pitch and we enjoyed a lot of the ball there so I can see Southampton enjoying trying to pick their way through Coventry's defence. It'll be an open game and I reckon there might be a few goals because Southampton are given that licence to express themselves.

For me, it's about how Southampton start and whether they can get ahead to quieten the home crowd. That's the key for them."

Richard says:

- Back Over 2.5 goals at [2.22] with the Saints to force an open game and Coventry, at home, obliged to come forward

- Lay Coventry at [2.1], given Southampton's style and midweek 2-0 victory over Norwich City.

- Saints' Adam Lallana To Score at any time, around [5.0] when the market develops