When Dublin manager Tom Carr protested mildly that Saturday's defeat by Roscommon shouldn't be taken out of context, he probably knew he was on a loser. With the national media parked on their doorstep, Dublin's teams come under disproportionate scrutiny.
Consequently - or subsequently - the Dublin public is less patient about their team's performances than the public in any other county. Carr's predecessor Mickey Whelan was hounded out of the job after losing a league match to an Offaly side that had just won the Leinster championship.
Over the past 25 years, Dublin's real status in the game has been much misunderstood. Since the 1920s, the county has only averaged on All-Ireland a decade. There was a period of dominance in 1970s, but the rise of Kerry put a stop to that.
Yet expectations have been on the rampage since and created ridiculous pressures for county managers. The huge population disguises the struggle for the hearts and minds of a catchment area with plenty of other things to occupy it.
Over the past 10 years, the championships have become far more competitive and Dublin have discovered that winning Leinster no longer guarantees a serious shot at an All-Ireland and there aren't anything like the number of handy matches in Leinster that there used to be.
Last summer, Kildare were simply better. They failed to challenge in the first half and gifted Dublin the space to build a six-point lead, but, once Dublin came under pressure in the second half, they folded.
Maybe Carr's initial instinct was correct. "I don't know what we have left to offer," he said afterwards. "We have put an awful lot of work in over the past three years and we have scoured the county to build this team." But a good deal of reflection at county board level resulted in his being given another crack at it.
Regardless of whether this was the right thing to do, such a decision shouldn't come up for review because three league matches are lost.
The problem is a championship problem and league performances have no bearing on it. As Carr himself pointed out, last season Dublin pulled impressive wins out of the hat against Galway and Kerry. He didn't finish the point but we can: This springtime steel didn't offer any accurate reflection of how they would react under pressure in the summer.
For nine years from 1986, Dublin qualified for all the league play-offs - winning three titles - and each summer suffered sickening championship disappointments. As soon as the sequence was abruptly halted with relegation in 1995, they won the All-Ireland.
It can be argued that this isn't a fair comparison as, in 1995, Dublin had a settled team and didn't need anything out of the league, other than the strong evidence that Jason Sherlock would make a big difference.
Look back at 1989 and the manner in which a wretched league final defeat by Cork followed a demoralising Leinster final defeat by Meath (when Charlie Redmond missed an injury-time penalty to draw the match). The team still managed to overturn Meath and win Leinster 10 weeks later.
The one thing Carr needs is a consistent team selection throughout the league. Teams which are in development as Dublin are can't afford the chopping and changing which is commonplace in the NFL.
Two years ago, Cork built an outstanding defence by keeping it together as a unit throughout the campaign. By contrast, Dublin have used 29 players in their three league matches to date.
Injury, unavailability and club commitments all contributed to that. When Carr has had the opportunity to field his best team in the championship, then is the time to judge, but, in the meantime, Carr's fiercest critics should calm down and concentrate on the club championships like the rest of us.
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