LONDON (Reuters) - HMV Group (LSE: HMV.L - news) said it was confident full-year pretax profit before one-off items would be towards the upper end of market expectations.

Market expectations for profit for the year to April 26 are in the range of 46-58 million pounds, the retailer, which owns bookseller Waterstone's as well as music shops under its own name, said in a trading update.

That compares with profit of 48.1 million pounds last year.

"As we complete the first full year of our three-year turnaround plan, we are ahead of where we expected to be," Chief Executive Simon Fox said in the statement on Friday.

"We still have much to do, but I am confident that the group is well positioned for the next phase of our transformation."

HMV said group like-for-like sales grew by 10.1 percent in the 16 weeks to April 26, and by 7.3 percent over the full year.

Like-for-like sales at HMV UK and Ireland grew 13.8 percent in the last 16 weeks of the year to April 26 and by 11.4 percent for the year as a whole.

Like-for-like sales at Waterstone's climbed 6.6 percent in the last 16 weeks and by 3.3 percent for the year.

Shares in HMV, which have outperformed the UK general retailers' index by around 102 percent in the past 12 months, had closed at 149.25 pence on Thursday, valuing the company at around 588 million pounds.

(Reporting by Mike Elliott, editing by Will Waterman)