THE Challenge Cup may be European rugby’s subsidiary tournament, but the teams competing in it are far from second rate, according to Edinburgh coach Duncan Hodge.

Buoyed by his team’s 45-10 league win over Treviso last weekend, Hodge takes his squad to Romania this week for their first Challenge Cup pool game against Timisoara Saracens. While the Romanians bring the excitement of playing against little-known opponents, matches follow against two more celebrated teams, Harlequins and Stade Francais, and Hodge is looking forward to the very different challenges that those three games will bring.

“The bigger tournament makes most of the headlines but look at the teams in our pool – there are great teams there,” the former Scotland stand-off said yesterday. “And it’s great to play against them.

“We have a great challenge in our pool with Timisoara, Harlequins and Stade Francais, and it starts with a team we don’t really know very well. But, in saying that, like any team we’ve received quite a lot of footage of them and we have analysed them and formulated thoughts.

“It’ll be a tough game over there. They have a big, physical pack, and in defence they’re certainly aggressive at getting the ball back and with their line speed, so there are things there we need to be very wary of.

“But we need to focus on our game and how we take it forward. This week has been about understanding the opposition, obviously, but building from last week it’s about focusing on what we do from the training pitch Monday to Friday to the game, and tying those things together so that we are preparing to win.”

The Treviso win followed a defeat in Connacht in Hodge’s first match as acting head coach following the sudden departure of Alan Solomons. The team’s PRO12 record this season is an unspectacular two wins and four losses from their opening half-dozen games, but Hodge has been encouraged by the players’ attitude both before and after the former coach left.

“The players have been good, so it was nice for them to get some reward on Friday night. It certainly wasn’t perfect by any means, but there were a lot of positives in there.”