If you believe everything written about Dublin hurling over the last 12 months, their chances of progressing beyond Sunday's first round championship game against Laois must be slim.

For six months after last summer's championship, they were without a manager and without any organised training. At the Blue Stars challenge, the traditional start to the new year, they put on a flawless display in how to hit a ball wide. Then they struggled throughout the league, managing to win just one of their six games.

The only ray of hope seemed to come with word that former Kilkenny manager Kevin Fennelly would be the man to finally fill the shoes of Michael O'Grady. With news of his appointment in mid January came talk of a brighter future and pending breakthroughs for the game in the capital.

No one expected it to be an easy transition but Fennelly's team goes into the game on Sunday knowing that they have a real challenge on their hands just to get one more day in the sun. Laois milled through Carlow and Meath to get this far and the feeling there is that their game is on the up.

To make matters worse, the Dublin panel has been hit by a succession of major withdrawals. Yet for team captain David Sweeney, the desire to perform at the highest level remains undiminished. "I certainly don't lack any motivation," he says, "and I've no ideas about giving up anytime soon. I love to play hurling and I love to grace the same field as the likes of DJ Carey. That's always a thrill for me but like everyone else I also want to win games as well."

But winning has been a problem for Dublin. They managed to come through the round-robin last year before making the expected fall to Kilkenny, yet it's been 40 years since their last Leinster title. And for a decade now they seem to be sliding down a slippery slope.

Then there is the withdrawal syndrome. From the team that beat Laois in last year's round-robin final, John Finnegan, Conor McCann, Liam Walsh and Sean Duignan are no longer part of the panel. Gordon Glynn has returned to his native Galway while Shane Ryan, Maghnus Breathnach and Risteard Brennan have all opted to concentrate on football.

Worse still is the news that experienced players like Kevin O'Donoghue, Aodhan de Paor and Dermot Daly are all suffering from injuries.

"It's definitely not as strong a panel now as we would have hoped," says Sweeney. "We have lost a lot of players for various reasons, whether it be work commitments or football or whatever. But we've got to make do with what we've got. People will feel we can only get better from here but it's not going to be easy.

"The old story of Dublin dropping their heads after five or 10 minutes of bad hurling is still a problem but with Kevin there now I think the attitude is changing. One of the first things he said to us was to believe in ourselves, but he's only been with us a short while and these things do take time."

Sweeney admits that the league situation was awkward. Fennelly has just come in and was eager to try out new players, but trying out new players against the likes of Offaly, Galway and Clare was always going to present some problems.

"We finished up the league with one of worst defeats (a 20-point loss to Offaly) and we haven't had a major test since then. So we don't really now where we stand. We do know that Laois will have that championship pace in their legs and are also a very physical side, way bigger than us. It's going to be a very tough game for us."

Having just turned 24, Sweeney is still optimistic about the future. The Ballyboden-St Enda's player, who usually roams around midfield but starts at wing forward on Sunday, has seen the under-age structures in Dublin greatly improve even since his own days as a county minor. The success of the Dublin colleges' side this season is a part of that, and the staring role played there by Conal Keaney saw him been called up into the senior panel.

"That work will only pay off in the future depending on how many players stay with the game. It does effect the morale of the whole team when players drop out for whatever reason, and there is a lot of pressure in committing to the game these days. But I plan to be around long enough to benefit from these younger players coming through."