IPSWICH Town will install Manchester United legend Roy Keane as their new manager within 36 hours.

Elliot Furniss

IPSWICH Town will install Manchester United legend Roy Keane as their new manager within 24 hours.

The fiery Irishman, who left Sunderland last year, has agreed to replace Jim Magilton, who was sacked yesterday after a season in which Town failed to reach the Championship play-offs.

Working with new chief executive Simon Clegg - who only joined the club on Tuesday - Keane's top priority will be to return Ipswich Town to the Premier League.

Keane will be unveiled at a Press Conference either later today or tomorrow. Whether he takes charge of the team for the penultimate game of the season remains to be seen. Development coach Bryan Klug has been made caretaker manager.

With Clegg and Keane, Ipswich now have two big-hitters at the helm. Suddenly, Ipswich Town will be back in the national media spotlight. Wherever Roy Keane goes, the national media follows.

Keane made his name as a player at Nottingham Forest, before being signed by Alex Ferguson at Manchester United where he was captain during some of the most successful years of Ferguson's reign at Old Trafford.

Keane's first - and until now, only - managerial job was at Sunderland, whom he steered to promotion to the Premier League, before leaving last December.

The end of Jim Magilton's three-year reign at Portman Road ended at noon yesterday, less than 24 hours after the official appointment of new club chief executive Simon Clegg.

Magilton was on compassionate leave in Belfast caring for his sick mother when he was given the news over the phone by club owner Marcus Evans.