Goalkeeper Kevin Pilkington is convinced a more settled defence will be key to Notts County's hopes of enjoying a successful 2009/10 season.

County's backline was constantly changed due to injuries last season.

Duo Michael Johnson and Stephen Hunt in particular missed long spells of the campaign, as did Pilkington's counterpart Russell Hoult.

Pilkington has experienced promotion out of League Two in the past with Mansfield Town, believes a settled defence is essential.

"A settled unit at the back will benefit us next year," he said.

"When I got promoted with Mansfield out of this League we had a settled defence every week.

"We didn't have that last season but the Manager is obviously aiming to do that next season."

Pilkington made 26 appearances last term and has more clean sheets at the very top of his wish-list for the new campaign after keeping just 4 in those outings.

"We didn't keep enough clean sheets and didn't score enough and that tells its own story," he admitted.

"If I was to play a full season I would be expecting to keep fifteen clean sheets minimum.

"We were nowhere near that last season; in fact we weren't even close to touching that sort of figure.

"As a team we have to build on the small number we did keep and look what we did in those games to keep the clean sheets.

"We must be stronger at the back next season as a complete unit."

The 35-year-old is relishing the battle with Hoult during pre-season training to start the campaign as first choice.

He said: "I'll come back for pre-season fitter than ever and I'm ready for the battle.

"I'll do my very best on the training ground and work as hard as I can and see what happens.

"At the end of the day it is out of my hands if I'll be playing or not, so what I have to do is as much as possible to get it into the manager's head that I should be playing."