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Derry aiming to reach Allianz Football League Division One - Brendan Rogers

9/7/2022  Derrys   Brendan Rogers    in action with  Galways  Shane Walsh     in Saturdays  All Ireland Football Semi Final at Croke Park   Picture  Seamus Loughran
9/7/2022 Derrys Brendan Rogers in action with Galways Shane Walsh in Saturdays All Ireland Football Semi Final at Croke Park Picture Seamus Loughran 9/7/2022 Derrys Brendan Rogers in action with Galways Shane Walsh in Saturdays All Ireland Football Semi Final at Croke Park Picture Seamus Loughran

Derry will be targeting promotion to the top flight of the National Football League once the new season gets underway says their roaming full back Brendan Rogers.

Rory Gallagher’s side just missed out on promotion last season, finishing third in Division Two behind league winners Roscommon and All-Ireland finalists Galway.

A round five draw with the Rossies along with an 11-point defeat to Galway in round six kept top tier football out of reach for the Oak Leaf County for at least another season.

Derry went on to enjoy a memorable 2022, claiming their first Ulster title since 1998 and reaching the All-Ireland semi-final, which they lost to the Tribesmen.

“When we were playing the league last year the sole focus was to win the league, it’ll be the same this year,” said the Slaughtneil defender.

“We don’t want to entertain anything else; we don’t want to entertain second best, we want to achieve as much as we can whether that be league, championship, McKenna Cup, you always want to win.

“We’re not to privy to having success so we’ll not be turning it away in any competition we’re in, so we’ll be trying to go for promotion this year and try to grow a bit as a team and hopefully take that into the championship campaign.”

It’s a stacked Division Two next season, with Dublin and Kildare entering the fray having suffered relegation last year. “On paper you would look at the teams in Division Two this year coming, and you would say it’s definitely got a lot of pedigree in it.

“I suppose the focus is probably going to be on Dublin and Kildare but make no mistake about it, Meath have a new management set up, Cork have a changed management set up from the league campaign last year.

“They’re going to be a lot fresher, a lot more excitable obviously looking forward to a league campaign as well. They probably didn’t have as good a league campaign as they would have wanted last year.

“Even the teams that have been there or there abouts for a while will probably be more competitive as well so it’s small factors like that, that make it that wee bit more competitive. It’s going to be an interesting league.”

Derry’s clash with Dublin will attract plenty of interest once the time comes and Rogers insists it’s one to look forward to. “One things for sure it’ll definitely be exciting. The games going to be in Celtic Park so there’ll be a lot of fans interested just to get seeing Derry playing against the top teams again.

“From a team perspective you’re going to be playing a team with a lot of the players that have won five-in-a-row All-Irelands. What a pedigree of a team that you want to be matching yourselves up against and if you can become as consistent as they have over the last number of years, that will be phenomenal.

“The learnings you can take from any team, yes Dublin may have a lot of experience, but we can’t say they’re better than any other team. We see ourselves as all equals in the league and we’ll try to approach it that way but it’s probably going to be the standout tie.”