JUST another game; it is what happens afterwards to the team that wins it that makes it special.

Ross Ford, Edinburgh's Test hooker, is anxious to play down the pressure on his side as the prepare for a European Challenge Cup semi final at BT Murrayfield that will make history.

Whether Ford and his teammates triumph on Friday or it is the Newport Gwent Dragons of Wales who fire through, the side that gets to the tournament climax at the Twickenham Stoop and the end of the month will never have been in a major European final before, though both have tasted the bitterness of defeat at the semi final stage.

The difference is that Edinburgh's near-miss was in the Heineken Cup, when they went to Dublin three years ago to face Ulster. The Dragons have only ever had a shot at glory in the second tier tournament that is occupying the attention of both teams this weekend. In 2007, they lost 46-29 to Clermont Auvergne in 2007, the eventual winners earning Verne Cotter, now the Scotland head coach, his first silverware at the club and helping them shed their losers' tag.

Ford admits that for Edinburgh, the dynamics are different this time round. You got the feeling three years ago that they had shocked themselves by beating Toulouse in the quarter final, but this time there is an air of expectation around the club that sits above the Dragons in the Guinness PRO12 and has the advantage of playing on their own patch.

Some of that may have eased after last weekend though. Edinburgh barely competed against Munster and were mauled out of the game even before they gave away a 19-point sin bin. The Dragons, in contrast, came from behind to catch and overhaul Leinster in a display full of grit and determination.

Asked if Edinburgh's no-show was a bit of a wake-up call, Ford was in full agreement: "Yes, I think so," he said. "It has helped us focus so we know we have to be on the ball the whole time. That game has brought everything back to reality. We know we are a good team but we have to be mentally there the whole time.

"The Dragons are always a tough team to play, they are very physical and they often cause trouble to teams down there. We fully respect them and the way they want to play. They are a good team; we just have to make sure we are better on the day.

"It is a semi-final so it is a massive game. We have to be right up there, which is something we know we can do. That Munster game has brought us back to earth. It is up to us to focus on what we can get better at in the short training time we have got, and keep going with the things that we are good at.

"This game to mean anything, we have to get to the final and we have to go on to win it. It would be a massive thing to win something of that standard, to bring some silverware to the club. We have the 1872 cup, but that is only two games and this is a whole competition it would be a huge thing to come away and win it."

With the benefit of more than a decade of professional rugby and 85 caps, he knows that the key to turning on the kind of performance that earned them wins in tricky venues like LLanelli and Galway as well as a home win over Glasgow, who top the Guinness PRO12, is to keep it simple. Concentrate on getting all the little things right and not the outcome.

"Words are useless. It is all about what you can do on the pitch and focusing on what you can do in training to fix what you can," Ford added. "It would be the biggest achievement at club level in my career to do that with Edinburgh. We have been through the ups and downs, to get something like that would be a massive boost, something the club could jump on and work from."