By Jackie Cahill

WESTMEATH skipper Jenny Rogers is craving promotion to Division 1 of the Lidl Ladies National Football League.

The Lake County face Donegal in Saturday's Division 2 decider at Parnell Park for the right to compete with the game's elite next year.

Victory for Westmeath would represent a remarkable rise from the depths of Division 4 to the top division in just six years.

Westmeath won the Division 4 title in 2011, as well as landing the All-Ireland intermediate crown, before claiming Division 3 glory a year later.

And now Rogers says the time is right to finally progress from the second tier.

The 26-year-old said: "We're looking forward to it and all very excited about Saturday, to go that extra step and get up to Division 1.

"It would be a fantastic achievement for us. We've been building since 2011 and we were in the Division 2 final against Galway in 2014.

"We ran them close but weren't able to finish it out and Donegal beat us in the semi-final last year.

"Now we're back in the final, we want to take that extra step and get the win.

"To be in Division 1 would be amazing for the county and we need to be playing against the top teams like Cork, Dublin and Mayo."

Donegal beat Westmeath in the group stages of the Division 2 campaign but Rogers is confident that important lessons were learned.

She explained: "One of the things we learned is that we're closing the gap and getting closer but we need to take our chances.

"We had a lot of possession but didn't use it and capitalise on it.

"If we get chances up front, we have to take them and be more clinical."

Rogers added: "It's definitely great progress but we haven't won anything yet.

"We've been there or thereabouts against bigger teams, running Mayo, Galway, Donegal and Armagh close in recent times, and Dublin in a Leinster final, but we need to take a scalp against one of those big teams.

"It might be our opportunity to do that on Saturday."

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