Armagh boss Kieran McGeeney not counting Derry out of championship race just yet!

Armagh's stunning 11 point win means Mickey Harte's Division One champions must defeat Westmeath in their final group game to secure third spot in Group One behind Armagh and Galway who will meet on the final day to decide top spot and the direct route tom the last eight.

Both counties went into Sunday's game seeking the statement victory that could ignite their championship season and while McGeeney was delighted with his team's performance, he knows well the other side of the coin and wasn't about to dismiss Derry as a force in this year's championship just yet.

"Listen, everybody talks. They (Derry) have lost one or two games and people are giving them a hard time, I've been in that boat myself," explained the Orchard boss.

"We probably punished them but I don't think the narrative was ever really the real story. It can be hard to twist things around. I know that's a third one (defeat), but I wouldn't be writing them off yet anyway."

Armagh have faced plenty of questions themselves over recent seasons after successive penalty shoot-out defeats to Derry and Donegal in the Ulster Final and McGeeney said it can be difficult for players to remain focused with so much scrutiny around the modern game.

"It's about trying to get people to stop listening to the noise. I said the last time, you (the press) can't say there were two evenly matched teams, one was as good as the other, that doesn't sell, and so the noise that they (the players) would hear, whether it's about me or putting on different subs and all that sort of stuff, or you can't do this, you can't do that," he added.

"It's a very personal thing for themselves, to be able to block that out because you hear it at home, you hear it in the street, so to be able to move on and understand, you were there or thereabouts over the last two years, and you have been, but take that as confidence.

"We've seen the way Donegal played in the game after (the Ulster Final); their confidence was very, very high so I think they've done a good job in terms of doing that.

"We've got great leaders, (Ciaran) Mackin is an outstanding individual for us in terms of how he leads the group as well as the way he plays, same with Conor O'Neill, and then hopefully we'll have Andrew (Murnin) and Paddy (Burns), and we had Rian (O'Neill) back, who I thought again put in a great shift for us."