MICK Harford will remain in charge of QPR this Saturday when they take on Ipswich Town.The former Colchester United assistant manager took temporary command after John Gregory was sacked and led the R's to their first win of the season when they beat Norwich City 1-0 at Loftus Road.

By Derek Davis

MICK Harford will remain in charge of QPR this Saturday when they take on Ipswich Town.

The former Colchester United assistant manager took temporary command after John Gregory was sacked and led the R's to their first win of the season when they beat Norwich City 1-0 at Loftus Road.

That led to Peter Grant leaving City and Harford has been preparing QPR for this weekend's clash although he is well aware that new owners Flavio Briatore and Bernie Ecclestone are looking to recruit Italian manager Francesco Guidolin.

Harford said: “I had a meeting with the chairman and he just said 'carry on and see where it takes us'.

“I enjoy working here and the players have responded well, so we'll see what happens and I'll get on with preparing the lads for the Ipswich game, which should be a good one.

“I'll keep doing the job to the best of my ability and hopefully we can get some results. We're still in a predicament - we're still bottom of the league and we need to win our home games.

“But if we remain nice and positive and play as we did against Norwich, there's a good chance we can start climbing the table.”

Guidolin is still settling his contract with Palermo, although he officially stepped down in May.

Briatore and Eccleston don't officially take over until November 7 when they attend an EGM but have for all intents and purposes been running the club for the past month.

Harford has on-loan Chelsea defender Mikele Mancienne available again after injury and is expected to replace Damian Stewart at centre-half, with Marcus Bignot in for left-back Chris Barker who has had a hernia operation.

Midfielder Simon Walton is still out with a cruciate ligament injury after signing for them from Charlton following a loan spell at Ipswich.

Blues boss Jim Magilton is still waiting to see how the current takeover talks at Portman Road progress but in the meantime is looking to push his side into the top six.

Town are chasing their first away win in seven months but then have two consecutive home matches at a ground where they have not lost since March, a run of eight games.

Jason De Vos is expected to be fit despite missing a couple of days' training this week with a knee injury. Town will want their skipper fit as three of De Vos' nine league goals for Town have come against the R's.

Tommy Miller will be looking to continue his goal-scoring now he is off the mark and makes his 150th Town appearance tomorrow in his third spell at Portman Road, although he was released as youth player before making his debut first time round.