Ian Holloway's criticisms of Brentford will not be hanging on the wall of the Bees' dressing room on Saturday.

The QPR boss tipped Brentford to go down and cited Mark Warburton's departure from Griffin Park as the reason for it.

Tipping the Bees to finish 22nd and in the final relegation place, the then Sky Sports pundit said: “Brentford are regressing. Mark Warburton got them punching above their weight.

“They still haven't replaced Andre Gray and Alan Judge will be missing for the start of the season. They could be in trouble.”

Video Loading

Brentford fans will be quick to remind the QPR boss that the Bees are safe from relegation, unlike Rangers, while the boys from TW8 will finish above his side this campaign.

For head coach Dean Smith, though, he played down the comments ahead of the contest.

He said: “Not really. I think it's public knowledge that in the job Ian was in at the time he had to make his predictions for how the season would go.

“There's always going to be some that don't go well for him and some that do. I'm sure he had Brighton and Newcastle in the top two but he had Brentford and Huddersfield in the bottom three.

“That's the job he was doing then. He's doing another job now and I'm looking forward to facing him on Saturday.”

Dean Smith

Brentford will be considered favourites and a GetWestLondon poll suggested that NO QPR player would even get into the Bees' side.

Smith added: “I think on current form we'd be considered favourites. QPR have lost their last five games, albeit by a single goal.

“Losing games results in a loss of confidence but they've got good players. We know, on their day, any side in this division can perform.”

Keep up to date with the latest news in west London via the freegetwestlondonapp. You can even set it to receive push notifications for all the breaking news in your area.

Available to download from the App Store or Google Play for Android now!