MISSING out on the dressing room banter is the biggest difference between playing and coaching that Gareth Ainsworth has noticed.

He says his team mates have made his transition from player to staff less painful than it could have been after being made player-coach at Adams Park.

Previous experience in the dugout at QPR gave Ainsworth the management bug but he admits his relationship with some of the players at Loftus Road suffered as a result.

The 39-year-old said: "At QPR when I was a player and I went on to manage it was really difficult. One day you're a team mate of the lads, the next day you're telling them what to do.

"I'm missing out on most of the banter because I'm upstairs in my office doing some session plans with Richard Dobson."

But life as player-coach with Blues is a different prospect, he says.

Ainsworth said: "I'm always going to be Gaz to the lads. They'll always respect me for what I've done throughout my career and how I play. They're a great set of lads and they've made it easy for me.

"I've been taking sessions as well as joining in. The gaffer's trusted me with coaching the first team. We all do it together, we try to keep it structured and work on a specific topic if we need to.

"It's a good learning curve for me and I've got two great people to learn off."

Ainsworth has never hidden his desire to get into management but said: "At the moment being a coach under Gary Waddock and Richard Dobson is more than enough for me. I'm learning plenty and I'd be stupid to think I could go straight in and become manager of a Premier League side like QPR. You start small and hopefully get there in the end.

"I'm really happy at Wycombe, it's a great club and it's where I want to be."

Adjusting to the longer days as a coach is another big difference he's noticed since changing roles.

He was in the dugout for Wanderers' friendly at Luton on Wednesday night, having put the non-playing members of the squad through their paces on the training ground in the morning.

Ainsworth said: "You don't realise as a player how easy it is and how well you're looked after. It's not easy as a coach. You're well looked after as a player but you can't go on forever as a player. I do want to be a coach and also a manager one day. This is my first step."