Dublin may be unbeaten after the first two rounds of the Leinster SHC having begun their campaign with a miraculous draw in Wexford and followed it up with a hard-fought win away to Carlow on Saturday - but boss Micheál Donoghue has reminded his players, you can't stand still in this game.
A fortunate 59th-minute Fergal Whitely goal gave them a cushion against Carlow at Dr Cullen Park, giving them three points from a possible four ahead of their meeting with Antrim at Parnell Park in a fortnight's time.
"In order to keep progressing you have to keep raising the bar every time you go out," Donoghue told RTÉ Sport after the game.
"That's the message constantly to the lads. We’ve a two-week gap now, we look forward to our first home game in two weeks’ time."
Antrim scored a famous win against Wexford at Corrigan Park in the day's early throw-in. The Ulstermen will arrive in Dublin for their meeting with Donoghue's side in fine fettle.
"Antrim are going really well, Darren [Gleeson, manager] is doing a great job with them," Donoghue said. "Everyone in Leinster is capable on any day of taking a result. It’s a really hard place to go up there and they got a really good result against Wexford."
Carlow had put it up to Galway on the opening weekend meaning Donoghue was not in the least bit surprised that his side would have to fight tooth and nail if they wanted to head back up the M7 with a win.
"We knew it was going to be a really tough encounter and that's what it turned out to be," Donoghue said. "Carlow started better than us and were well worth the lead that they had. They were probably disappointed they weren’t a few more points ahead.
"We weren’t happy with the way we were going, we addressed a few things at half-time. We have to give huge credit to the lads, they came out and put in a decent second-half performance.
"Carlow had a lot of confidence from their performance against Galway last week. Nobody wants to go out and get beat, but they put in a massive performance.
"Obviously this was their home game and everyone targets their home games and I’m sure they targeted this one.
"We know it’s a tough one but I thought we responded well in the second half when we needed to."
The result leaves Dublin top of the table overnight as the only team on three points although either Kilkenny or Galway - or both, in the event of a draw - will pass them after their Sunday afternoon clash at Pearse Stadium.
Watch a hurling double-header, Galway v Kilkenny in the Leinster Championship (2pm) and Limerick v Tipperary in the Munster Championship (4pm), on Sunday on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to live commentary on Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
