Interview/Armagh forward Steven McDonnell: Ian O'Riordan talks to Steven McDonnell about how Armagh are desperate for another All-Ireland title

They say in sport, as in life, there should be no regrets, but there's a feeling in Armagh football that there'll be plenty of regrets if this current team doesn't win another All-Ireland title.

That's the word according to Steven McDonnell. Armagh's most dangerous forward has no problem admitting that despite the unprecedented high of 2002 - when he helped Armagh win their first and only senior football title - the team won't feel fully satisfied unless they win that second All-Ireland, and ideally this year. That quest begins on Sunday when they face Monaghan in Clones in the first of the Ulster football quarter-finals.

There's probably some added incentive after watching their old rivals Tyrone collect a second All-Ireland in three years last summer. But this season Armagh want to maximise their potential.

McDonnell said: "We do feel we let one, if not two, All-Irelands slip through our fingers, going back to when we drew with Kerry in 2000. We came close to Galway the following year, when they went on to win, so we do have a lot of ifs and buts. Like any chance you get, if you don't take it, you'll regret it, and we are living to regret some of our mistakes.

"So if we don't win another one now we'd see it as a failure, yes. I think with the success we've had, like the five Ulster titles in the last seven years, I think another All-Ireland to go along with that is definitely still the ambition. If I could speak for the likes of Kieran McGeeney and Paul McGrane, well I know them boys want another All-Ireland as well."

If Armagh had to isolate one regret that would probably be last year, when they looked to have edged across the line first in their All-Ireland semi-final against Tyrone. That all changed in the last five minutes, however, when Tyrone rose from the dead again and won by a point.

The hurt from that game still lingers: "At that stage yeah, going into the last five minutes, we were just thinking if we could hold on we had this game won. Unfortunately for us, Tyrone went up the field and, like all great teams, never gave up until the end. And I think that's why they're All-Ireland champions.

"Maybe there's less expectations on us this year because of that, but from our point of view that's a good sign. We always feel that less pressure is better."

The enduring questions of "have they the legs" and "have they the hunger" still hang over Armagh, yet McDonnell has a simple response to both: Joe Kernan wouldn't have returned for a fifth year as manager unless the answer was yes in both cases.

"I think it was very important Joe and selector Paul Grimley came back. I believe they've been Armagh's greatest ever managers. They still have the huge respect of the players, but I also know they wouldn't have come back unless they thought there was another year left in this team. Maybe another two. I mean we do have a good few younger players coming through, and we don't see why Armagh can't get stronger over the next year or so.

"And I don't believe we're any less focused. If you think for one second it's going to be an easy game, and take your eye off the ball, you're in trouble. It's happened to us enough times already there against Fermanagh and Monaghan before that. We thought they'd be easy enough passages. So every game is a battle and a half in Ulster, that's why we know Monaghan will be up for this one, especially after being relegated in the league."

McDonnell's own motivation for the summer is heightened by the fact he was troubled by an ankle injury for much of last summer, which he now admits took much of the sting out of his attacking threat. "I believe I was in the form of my life after the league win last year. Probably playing the best football I ever played. Unfortunately I picked up that bad ankle injury three weeks later, on the Wednesday night before we played Fermanagh. I was foolish to rush back and play in that game.

"Instead it set me back five or six weeks. I think I played through the pain, and thinking back now that was definitely a mistake. The Ulster final replay against Tyrone was the first game I had no strapping on the ankle. I don't like going out there with any strapping at all. It definitely does restrict your kicking a bit, I think. Once the summer went on, though, the stronger it got, and it was just a pity we didn't get one more game out of it."