Latest
Overview
Season so far
Tournament record
Last season's Amlin Challenge Cup winners Cardiff Blues take on Edinburgh. - 07/10/2010 16:35
Last season’s Amlin Challenge Cup winners Cardiff Blues take on Edinburgh.
Cardiff have been present in all but one Heineken Cup campaign and were finalists in the inaugural final in 1996 losing out to Toulouse in injury-time.
Since then they have reached four quarter-finals plus two semi-finals, the most recent of which was in 2009 when they lost to Leicester Tigers in an historic penalty shoot-out.
Edinburgh have been present in 13 previous editions of the tournament, reaching the quarter-finals in 2004 but they have been dealt a major blow ahead of the game with fly-half Phil Goodman ruled out of action with an ACL injury.
The two sides have never met in Europe but face each other on a regular basis in the Magners League. Cardiff came out on top in the most recent of their battles, winning 34-23. But Edinburgh have enjoyed the better record between the two sides in recent years, winning the four previous ties prior to their September defeat.
Casey Laulala was the inspiration for Cardiff Blues as they beat Edinburgh by a single point at the Cardiff City Stadium. - 09/10/2010 20:20
Casey Laulala was the inspiration for Cardiff Blues as they beat Edinburgh by a single point at the Cardiff City Stadium.
The former New Zealand centre created one try and scored another to help his side to Heineken Cup success.
Scotland fly-half Dan Parks had an off day with the boot, missing six kicks at goal in a tense Pool 1 fixture
Edinburgh took an early deserved lead, Chris Patterson scoring a penalty before Allan Jacobsen barged his way over. Patterson added the conversion to give the Scots a 10-0 advantage.
Cardiff threatened but could not convert pressure into points, Leigh Halfpenny coming close but was denied by a try saving tackle.
Parks was successive with his fourth attempt at goal to get the home side off the mark. Laulala then stepped past David Blair with ease to release his captain Paul Tito, who shipped on to Czekaj as Edinburgh ran simply out of defenders. Czekaj scored, Parks converted and added a further penalty to leave Edinburgh trailing 13-10 at half-time.
The second-half withered to a stand-still before the final 11 minutes when Laulala went over for his try and then Ben Cairns secured a losing bonus point for the visitors.
LIVE - TEST - Commentary