The 30-year-old became the first winner from the Brandywell club to pick up the SSE Airtricity/Soccer Writers Ireland Player of the Month award in two-and-a-half years when landing the prestigious accolade for June after a string of stunning performances. Given the way he's started the month of July, the Foylesiders might not have too long to wait for another! He's been instrumental in Derry's revival after the midseason break and has been heavily involved in 10 of the 12 goals scored during a four match winning run which has fired them back in the title race. His sublime touch and finish in the 7-2 thrashing of Waterford on Friday night was his 50th goal for Derry in 189 appearances across two spells at the club - becoming just the 12th player to reach that milestone for the Brandywell outfit! The former Celtic man is in his fourth season back at Derry since his trophy-laden spell at Dundalk and admits he's enjoying his best form in a Candy Striped shirt so far. "It's my fourth year here now," he said. "And I feel like this has been my best sort of time I've had. And I've had a lot of games, been a bit consistent, touch wood, I've been injury free. Everything's going well this year. "I've had a great pre-season under Tiernan [Lynch] and he's really helped me since he's come on. And look, it's just going well. I'm enjoying my football at the minute. And the team's winning, so we're in a good place." When asked about his future plans, it's clear Duffy's only intention is to end Derry's 28 year wait for the championship. "I have another year next year, so I'm still under contract for another year. I would love to be here for... look, until I finish my career would be ideal, you know what I mean? I'm from Derry, I don't want to go anywhere else. So the longer I'm here, the better, really. "I'm really enjoying it here at the minute. It's great. So hopefully I'll be here for a long time." His two league winner medals at Oriel Park are amongst his treasured possessions but the Galliagh native insists winning the league with Derry would eclipse everything he's done in his career so far. "I think it means that much more to me now being back home. Once I signed back here, the only thing I wanted to do was to come back here and be successful. "I've had unbelievable years down at Dundalk, I'll never forget them. But I couldn't help but think, you know, if I came back to Derry and had some of that success here, it would just mean that much more to me. "So playing for my hometown club, all my friends and family being at the games and stuff. It just makes it that wee bit more special. And look, we're on a good run at the minute and it would be great if we were to be successful this year." The emotions from last year's end of year collapse which saw them miss out on a league and cup double has been used as a driving force this term. "We were a couple of weeks away from potentially doing the double and then we came away with nothing, not even Europe. So it was very disappointing. That's why I came back to this club. I came back to try to win trophies and especially win the league. "You were that close to it and then just to be let down over the last few weeks, it was a hard one to take. But I'm using that as motivation this year, just in my own mindset how disappointed I was last year just to try to go and do everything I can to put that right this year." Duffy won the player of the month award twice in 2018 with Dundalk [April and August], the year the Lilywhites won the double and he also finished a memorable campaign with the coveted Player of the Year title. He's been rolling back the years this year under Lynch - starting all 23 games so far - and is relishing the freedom afforded him by the Brandywell boss alongside Liam Boyce and Gavin Whyte in a fearsome three-pronged attack. With eight goals and seven assists to his name so far, Duffy says Lynch is continuously challenging him to increase his numbers - a task he's glad to accept. "I just think about us winning games on Friday," he began. "That's the main thing and just trying to be involved in goals, trying to do my best to help the team win, really. But it's nice hearing the milestones then and hopefully they keep coming. "That's the main thing I wanted to do this year was just try to be consistent. I think the last few years I've been here, I've been a few spells where a couple of good games and then a few games where I've done nothing and I just want to try to affect games every week in, week out. "I'm on eight goals now. The manager's been on to me all year about trying to get me double figures and assists and that's good. I like him driving me on like that and always expecting stuff from me. I'm just in a good place at the minute so hopefully I can keep them coming." Duffy's sensational winning strike against Shelbourne at Tolka Park instigated an impressive winning run which has closed the gap on Shamrock Rovers to nine points with two games in hand. Confidence is high. "It is. And we've been gradually getting there. I think the last two games you can see throughout the whole team the confidence in everyone, the freedom, sort of, like even in our movements and stuff. "There were times on the night that our left wing back was playing up front and our right wing back was up front at times and I was in at right back or left back. "And we're just playing with that complete freedom and enjoying ourselves and everyone understands the rules. Everyone's confident in what we're doing because we're working that hard on it every day in training and it's finally starting to show through now and I just hope we can keep it up now. "There's still areas that we can improve on as well. And as I said, Tiernan's constantly working on it. The staff's constantly working on how we can get better at it. And I still think there's more to come from us. It's been a good few weeks from us but we need to keep going and we know ourselves that there's more to come." Derry travel to Sligo Rovers on Saturday knowing a fifth win on the bounce would close the gap on the summit to just SIX points and Duffy is hoping for a similar free-flowing display like the one which blew away the Blues last Friday night. "It was an enjoyable night on Friday. I think throughout the team, everyone enjoyed it. We were playing probably the best football we've played and I think Tiernan's plans are really coming through in us now. "It obviously took a bit of time but I think you can see the last three or four games, that's the way we want to play. We want to play exciting football and get everyone in the Brandywell off their feet and I think Friday was just perfect. That's the way we've set a marker there and we need to try to keep going." Duffy pipped second placed Waterford striker Padraig Amond and third placed Dayle Rooney (Bohemians) to the June award.