Rey Lee-Lo is relishing the red-hot atmosphere of Judgement Day as he targets a first victory over the Ospreys.
The Samoan centre has been in fine form since returning from injury and scooped the man-of-the-match award following a two-try performance in Friday’s Guinness PRO12 draw with Ulster.
Now he is counting down the days until the Principality Stadium clash with the Ospreys and hopes the Blues can produce even more high-octane rugby to clip their rival’s wings.
Lee-Lo said: “I haven’t won against the Ospreys yet. It’s three from three since I’ve been here - two last year and one this year so I’m looking forward to this one.
“It’s a derby, it’s Judgement Day so it should be a big game. They’re looking to make the top four, they’re a good team with good players so it should be a good game.
“Last year Judgement Day was close to a Test match, like Samoa during the World Cup time. When I ran out before the game it was buzzing I could see how much rugby means to people in Wales.
“As a team we owe them a performance but we just need to work on ourselves and what we can do. We have to play for 80 minutes or 90 minutes if there’s overtime. We need to do the hard work over the next three or four days and just look forward to Saturday.”
Lee-Lo caused havoc in tandem with Willis Halaholo last week and he is enjoying the attacking brand of rugby the Blues are producing.
The midfield duo set a new PRO12 record for defenders beaten in the encounter and he is thrilled to see his former Hurricanes teammate hitting form at Wales’ Capital Region.
He continued: “When I woke up in the morning and saw it was sunny I knew there was going to be some running rugby plus the guy inside me (Willis Halaholo) helped me a lot - I was just able to finish off the good runs that he does.
“He can do stuff that no one else can and help the other boys outside him - he sees those mis-matches and one-on-ones, which is just what the likes of Nipper and Cuthy are looking for.
“It’s good to have him back and it’s good to have competition, there’s heaps of us now which is good and puts pressure on everyone at training.
“The Leinster game was my first game back after six weeks so I was fresh. It’s always good to have a break after a long time playing.
“I always want to be out there with the boys but I can’t do much about a head knock and the rest helped too.
“That’s the way we want to play as a team. Our boys can play and our forwards have good skills so it was pretty good.
“But we have to perform for 80 minutes and not 50 or 60. It has to be 80 minutes and we’ll keep working, the seasons almost over but we’ve still got something to play for. We want to finish seventh and we’ll keep grinding and keep going.”
Lee-Lo is also likely to come up against some familiar faces in the Ospreys ranks with Keiron Fonatia also a former teammate at the Crusaders.
He added: “Yeah those two players have been playing really well and obviously Josh (Matavesi) is a good Fijian with his offloads, stepping and his kicking game, he’s got x factor.
“Fonatia, I played with at Crusaders. He’s a good man and a good player so it should be interesting if we (Lee-Lo and Halaholo) get selected again this week.”