ST MIRREN assistant boss Mark Spalding believes this week’s league opener against Rangers offers his players the perfect chance to show what they are capable of this season.

The Ladbrokes Championship finally gets underway on Friday night when Ian Murray’s side make the short trip along the M8 to Ibrox.

Mark Warburton’s men are the strong favourites to go on to win the title and will be looking to get their campaign off to a flyer in front of their own fans.

Spalding, though, believes a match like this also gives Saints the chance to demonstrate their own ambitions.

The St Mirren management team – whose latest capture is Rangers forward Calum Gallagher – have been putting in the hours studying footage of all of Rangers’ recent games, and Spalding believes they will be well prepared by the time the first whistle blows.

He told SportTimes: “We’re looking forward to this game and it’s a great place for our players to put a marker down for the season. We’re looking at ways to devise a game plan that we feel will hopefully minimise Rangers’ strengths while maximising ours.

“I’ve been to see them myself, we’ve had scouts at their other matches, and we’ve studied footage of their games, so we’re doing as much as we can to be ready. It’s a completely different Rangers side to what we came up against last year when we were at Dumbarton.

"They seem a lot more expansive and looking to play football, so it will be a different challenge to what we are used to. But it’s a great place to go to start the season and hopefully make a good first impression.”

Rangers were comfortable winners in their only previous game against Championship opposition last month – the 6-2 thrashing of Hibs in the Petrofac Training Cup – but it gave Spalding a better idea of what to expect from Warburton and his players.

He added: “Their win over Hibs was interesting as we had been intrigued to see how both teams were going to play. They both looked to play it out, and if Hibs had scored again early on, it could have been 2-0 and the game would have been different.

"But Rangers scored from the free-kick and then kicked on from there. But that match certainly gives us food for thought. We’ve seen them a few times and they’ve played similar players and a similar system, so that helps our preparation.”

Spalding was part of Murray’s coaching staff at Dumbarton last year and chose to follow him to Paisley once the opportunity arose. He admits it has been a hectic few months, but believes it will all be worthwhile in the end.

He added: “It’s been really busy so far. The days have been long – 13 or 14 hours sometimes – but I wouldn’t have it any other way. The coaching staff are in early doors before 8am most days and sometimes not leaving until 8 at night, but we all share the belief that the harder we work, the better we’ll get.

"We’re analysing ourselves, our opponents, our methods and everything else all the time. We’re putting everything into it to try to make St Mirren the best they can be. We believe by putting in the hours we’ll get the rewards we deserve.”