With every passing week Michael Mifsud takes another giant step towards becoming one of the hottest properties in English football.

Two more goals last Saturday and another midweek make him joint top scorer in the Championship and there can be no denying he's a player in a rich vein of form.

Let's be honest. When he first moved to Coventry he was a bit of an unknown quantity in terms of English football. Sure, he had shown plenty of promise at his other clubs as well as for our national team. But that was no guarantee he would make the grade in England. Today, however, he is quite rightly viewed as a classy, quick striker with plenty of talent. And he just seems to be getting better.

If he keeps his current surge going over the next couple of months, and quite possibly even if he doesn't, then come January it will be time for Michael to make some tricky, career-defining decisions.

Undoubtedly he will be a target for other clubs who are always on the lookout for players with an eye for goal. Some of those will be from the Championship but some will no doubt be from the Premiership.

And, given Coventry's current financial status, I would fully expect them to seriously listen to any offers in the three or four million pound region. Their creditors may, in fact, give them no choice but to listen.

And that is where real hard decisions will need to be taken by Michael.

The temptation will be, of course, to move on. Even if Coventry are towards the top of the league at the turn of the year, they will struggle to maintain a promotion challenge given their money problems.

And that thought will make the prospect of leaving more appealing. However, from a career point of view, moving to another Championship side would, at best, be little more than a sideways step.

Even if the new club were certainties to go up, Michael would probably spend the rest of this season bedding in and then the whole of next season playing for a side battling against relegation. And scoring for a team down the bottom end of the top division is a tricky proposition.

On the other hand, it could well be that bids for Michael come in from some Premiership sides in January. Teams like Derby, Bolton, Sunderland and Wigan are all desperately short of goals and would love to get their hands on a man who could fire them away from relegation.

Again, though, the man who has made the word 'mosquito' his own needs to be careful. The Premiership is littered with players who made the step up at the wrong time to the wrong club and have faded into the sort of obscurity that even Kevin Costner would be scared of.

The most recent example is David Nugent who managed to break into the senior England team while playing for Preston. Subsequently he made a big money move to Portsmouth where he started two matches at the beginning of the season and is now rotting in the reserves.

For what it's worth, Michael should stick with Coventry till the end of the season assuming he is given that option.

If he puts in the same level of effort he has been doing over the past couple of months, he could well end up with 20 to 25 goals.

And that will make him a more attractive proposition with even the bigger, more established top-flight teams willing to take a chance on signing him. Clubs like Blackburn, Manchester City and West Ham.

The other plus side to this, of course, is that it allows him to remain loyal to Coventry - something he is very keen to be - and possibly even contribute towards them going up.

I am positive that Michael is getting all the right advice from his family, friends and representatives and, when push comes to shove, he will make a decision that is based on calm, calculated facts.

I just hope the lure of big money - and there will be plenty of it splashing around come January - doesn't prove a greater incentive than fulfilling his potential.

But, from speaking to people who know the man, that shouldn't really be an issue.

Decisions, decisions...

History is littered with people making poor choices.

Abraham Lincoln's decision to spend a quiet night at the theatre, for example, was not the best move he ever made. And John F. Kennedy, in hindsight, might have been better off spending the afternoon anywhere other than Dallas.

This week I made a pretty poor decision of my own. Fair enough, the consequences were not as bad as those suffered by old Abe and Johnny, but I still felt pretty stupid afterwards.

You see, on Tuesday I was torn between watching either the Chelsea game or the Liverpool game.

Hmmm. My thought process involved a quick look at current form. Liverpool were missing a lot of players and generally playing poorly in Europe. Chelsea, on the other hand, were on a bit of run and should put on a decent showing in Germany. Armed with this belief I chose the London side and sat down to watch 90 minutes of goalless, if not entirely boring, Champions League football.

As the game wound down to its inevitable conclusion, I flicked over just in time to see Liverpool score their eighth of the evening.

Normally I would have been channel hopping between the two but some basic instinct had told me not to bother.

Probably that same instinct that told Mr Lincoln "it's just a musical, what can possibly go wrong?"

The spy's the limit

The plot continues to thicken in the world of Formula 1.

Following their own spying case in which they were found guilty of being illegally in possession of Ferrari documents, McClaren are now accusing Renault of doing the same thing to them.

I have no idea if the claims are true - a hearing is set for December on this one - but there is rarely smoke without fire in these cases.

Despite the exciting conclusion to the season in terms of the drivers' title, it has otherwise been one to forget for Bernie Ecclestone and the people that run it.

Perhaps he should sit down with all the team bosses and insist they stop trying to dabble in the affairs of their competitors.

Alternatively he could always see if MI5, the CIA or Mossad are interested in setting up their own team...

Letter of the week

Jeremy Cauchi, Birkirkara, writes:

I read with interest your piece this week about Lewis Hamilton leaving England for Switzerland because of how famous he has become and how he can't spend time with his friends any more because of people following him. I have to say that I agree with you that it is nothing to do with the fame but a lot to do with the money.

Everybody knows that Switzerland has the most relaxed taxation laws in Europe and that is obviously the real reason for his move. If he wanted to spend more time with his friends as he suggested, surely he would not have gone all the way to Switzerland to do so.

Lewis was very badly advised by his managers to make the statements he did. It would have been so much more palatable if he had just admitted that he was moving for financial reasons rather than making things up.

I am a very strong supporter of the McClaren team and will continue to support them although my respect for Hamilton has gone down a level after his naive comments. Does honesty count for nothing any more in the sports world?