The countdown to pop stardom is on for Bradford teenager Gareth Gates, pictured.

Pop Idol wannabe Gareth was today beginning rehearsals for next week's performance on the smash ITV1 show knowing he could be just three weeks away from sure-fire chart success.

And back home in East Bowling, mum Wendy is confident that he will blow away the judges and the viewers again on Saturday.

Gareth is now through to the last four of the competition, which sees the singer with the least telephone votes eliminated each week.

He is such a hot favourite with fans that Bradford bookies John Woods have already promised to pay-out on bets on him.

In a national newspaper poll at the weekend, Gareth secured around 11,000 out of 20,000 votes - more than double his nearest rival.

Today mum Wendy told the Telegraph & Argus that she was confident that popularity would be reflected in the voting by Pop Idol viewers.

And she said Gareth's performances were getting better and better as the weeks wear on - and the rival contestants drop-out.

On Saturday, when there was a big band theme to the show, Gareth won over the audience with a rendition of Bobby Darin's 1959 hit Mack the Knife.

But it was after the song, when Gareth overcame his much-publicised stammer to chat to Pop Idol hosts Ant and Dec that Wendy thought the 17-year-old student really came into his own.

"Gareth was great on Saturday, absolutely fantastic and I was overjoyed," she said. "He really showed his personality, the one that he can often not get out because of his stammering. I think that it was the first time Gareth really displayed his true colours."

Next week, the wannabe pop stars will perform two songs each - one a ballad and the other an up-tempo number.

And, as usual, Wendy will again travel down to the capital on Thursday to give her son a bit of extra backing as the pressure steps-up ahead of Saturday's show.

Gareth begins rehearsing the songs on Wednesday each week, and spends most of his time tuning-up in his hotel bedroom, away from the blaze of publicity surrounding the programme.

Wendy Gates today hit back at claims by a newspaper columnist that Gareth's success was thanks to him winning a 'sympathy vote'.

Outspoken TV critic Charlie Catchpole claims Gareth's backing in the polls has been due to his stammer, which makes it difficult for him to chat to presenters Ant and Dec in interviews.

"Let's face it, viewers are voting for Gareth Gates, the singer with the stammer, because they feel sorry for him," Catchpole wrote in the Daily Star yesterday.

Wendy said she had been "really hurt" by the snipe. "It really made me want to ring up and tell him what I thought," she said. "It is a load of rubbish. It's not his stammer that will make him a Pop Idol, it is his look and his voice."