Yes, it makes a difference.

Believe it or not, you can get away with a LOT these days antenna-wise.

Two stories I often tell are two times when (Due to unusual circumstances) I had two flights where on one, the antenna was still wrapped around the Rx. I got a few glitches which caused me to land early, but the plane flew at least 5 laps of the field like that.

The second time, after a completely uneventful flight, I removed the canopy and saw that the antenna was just laying inside the radio compartment in a big rat's nest.

That second flight happened to be during a video I was shooting for a review.[link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/magazine/article_display.cfm?article_id=706] Here's a link to the review[/link]. If you watch the video, you'll see that there wasn't even a glitch.

Now I do NOT recommend trying this, but it just goes to show that you can easily leave a little extra antenna lying around as long as you have the majority of it set up properly.

As for me, Since I do a lot of reviews and therefore need to remove and install radios often, I put the antenna through a piece of plastic tubing and tie a knot in the end. Now I can slip it out of one fuse and slide it down another easily.