Having been initially appointed on an interim basis Gavin Dykes looks the most likely candidate to take over at Finn Harps following the resignation late on Monday evening of Charlie McGeever.

A matter of hours before McGeever confirmed to the club's board that he had decided to go, Harps' chairman Conor Boyce was insisting that his contribution to the club over the three and a half years in charge had earned him the right to more time to sort out the team's terrible start to the new season.

Yesterday, however, McGeever confirmed that the defeat by Drogheda on Friday night and the manner in which it came about made his mind up for him that it really was time to move on.

"I'd said all along that if we got our noses in front in a game we'd be very difficult to pull back," he said, "so to lose after being two up at half time and playing some of the best football I'd seen from us over the last couple of seasons was hard to take.

"I didn't rush into anything afterwards, though. I took the weekend to think about it and felt mainly relieve when I informed the board of my decision. I have to thank them for the fact that during my time in charge they never interfered in any way with anything that I tried to do. I just hope now that they continue to give that sort of backing to Gavin."

McGeever describes the new player boss as "a special sort of character" who "is obviously cut out for management" but with just one point from seven games the board will be keen to see some early signs that Dykes, who has no experience of management, is capable of sparking a revival before offering the post to him on a longer term basis.

At present, though, there would not appear to be too many alternatives to the big centre half. Felix Healy has been the other main name to crop up in speculation over the past couple of weeks but the appointment of the former Derry City boss would be unlikely to be enthusiastically greeted by some of those who had previously played under him at the Brandywell.

McGeever expressed the hope yesterday that Dykes would get the job long term but insisted that the main thing is that the club does enough over the coming months to avoid the threat of relegation.

"There has been too much work put in and too much money invested here for the club to go down now. It is unthinkable that it would happen after all that we have been through but if the team wins against Sligo at the weekend then they would be off the bottom on goal difference and that might well provide the psychological boost they need to get going properly."