Newcastle United winger Damien Duff has pledged his future to the club despite seeing the club relegated to the Championship.
The 30-year-old Irishman scored the own goal on Sunday which took the club down into English football's second tier.
Keen to make amends, Duff, who is on a lucrative £70,000-a-week contract with the Tynesiders, has now vowed to do all he can to help the club win promotion at their first attempt.
He told the Newcastle Evening Chronicle: "I'm as loyal as they come and, whether the gaffer (Alan Shearer) stays or goes, I'd love to try to get Newcastle back up into the Premier League.
"I don't know what words can describe the way I feel. I'm devastated. The lads haven't tasted relegation apart from me at Blackburn and Nicky Butt at Birmingham.
"When it happened at Blackburn, I wasn't planning on seeing it again in my career. It's not a nice feeling.
"No disrespect to the Championship, but Newcastle are too big a club to be down there. I plan on being straight back up (in the Premier League) after next season."
Duff has also called on Shearer to become manager on a full-time basis despite his failure to keep the Magpies in the top flight after an eight-game spell at the helm.
"I've loved working with him," he said. "It's been a proper, proper football club for eight weeks, and it's about time. It's just disappointing we couldn't stay up for him and the fans.
"I think he's been brilliant even though we haven't got the results to keep us up.
"It's the first time in a long while that this place has felt like a proper football club. Things are done right and it's been a breath of fresh air.
"If there's one man to get us back up, it's Alan Shearer."
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The 30-year-old Irishman scored the own goal on Sunday which took the club down into English football's second tier.
Keen to make amends, Duff, who is on a lucrative £70,000-a-week contract with the Tynesiders, has now vowed to do all he can to help the club win promotion at their first attempt.
He told the Newcastle Evening Chronicle: "I'm as loyal as they come and, whether the gaffer (Alan Shearer) stays or goes, I'd love to try to get Newcastle back up into the Premier League.
"I don't know what words can describe the way I feel. I'm devastated. The lads haven't tasted relegation apart from me at Blackburn and Nicky Butt at Birmingham.
"When it happened at Blackburn, I wasn't planning on seeing it again in my career. It's not a nice feeling.
"No disrespect to the Championship, but Newcastle are too big a club to be down there. I plan on being straight back up (in the Premier League) after next season."
Duff has also called on Shearer to become manager on a full-time basis despite his failure to keep the Magpies in the top flight after an eight-game spell at the helm.
"I've loved working with him," he said. "It's been a proper, proper football club for eight weeks, and it's about time. It's just disappointing we couldn't stay up for him and the fans.
"I think he's been brilliant even though we haven't got the results to keep us up.
"It's the first time in a long while that this place has felt like a proper football club. Things are done right and it's been a breath of fresh air.
"If there's one man to get us back up, it's Alan Shearer."
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