Edinburgh were dominating the opening encounter playing expansive rugby and a Laidlaw penalty after three minutes saw them take the lead. The Scottish capital side were proving a threat with a superb long pass putting Lee Jones in space, however, Halfpenny enforced a solid tackle on the winger and the Scots were held up over the try-line for a scrum five.

The Blues, playing in the opposition's half, won a penalty for Edinburgh not rolling away that Halfpenny went on to slot neatly between the posts.

Visser got the Scottish side back in the lead when he touched down in the corner, despite Halfpenny putting in another tackle. This cast doubt on the try, which was referred to the TMO and then given to the visiting side.

Halfpenny slotted two long distance efforts just before the break to bring the score to 9-8 with the Blues ahead for the first time.

Half time Cardiff Blues 9 Edinburgh 8

The opening minutes of the second half saw Pretorius do superbly to break from a retreating scrum and carry out of the twenty-two before feeding Navidi who passed to Tom James. The winger showed some electric pace to break all the way to the Edinburgh twenty-two before losing his footing as he tried to round Tonks. The Edinburgh fullback was shown the yellow card soon after for killing the ball when the Blues were five metres out.

A try soon came as the Blues spread the ball, Cuthbert showed his pace and power to break through the midfield to touch down under the posts to score. Halfpenny converted.

Laidlaw and Halfpenny exchanged penalties to bring the score to 19-11 and the crowd were on their feet minutes later when James, again, broke into the Edinburgh half. Hewitt failed to gather his pass and Edinburgh came close to scoring through Richie Rees just yards out, before Navidi was sin binned for coming in from the side. Edinburgh went for the scrum and were controversially awarded a penalty-try on the first put in. Laidlaw converted to make it 19-18 with 10 minutes left.

Patchell had come on for Halfpenny and the young fly half was just short with a long distance effort from his own half, but it was Laidlaw who clinched the game with a neatly taken drop goal on 77 minutes.

Cardiff Blues 15. Leigh Halfpenny (63off) 14. Alex Cuthbert 13. Gavin Evans 12. Dafydd Hewitt 11. Tom James 10. Ceri Sweeney 9. Lewis Jones (51off)

8. Andries Pretorius (c) 7. Sam Warburton 6. Josh Navidi 5. James Down (65off) 4. Bradley Davies 3.Benoit Bourrust (47off) 2.Rhys Williams (58off) 1.Taufa'ao Filise

16. Marc Breeze (58off) 17. Nathan Trevett (74off) 18.Thomas Davies (47on) 19. Lou Reed (65on) 20.Luke Hamilton 21.Lloyd Williams (51on) 22. Rhys Patchell (63on) 23. Thomas Williams

Edinburgh 15 Greig Tonks 14 Lee Jones 13 Nick De Luca 12 John Houston 11 Tim Visser 10 Greig Laidlaw (c) 9 Richie Rees 8 Stuart Mclnally 7 Roddy Grant 6 David Denton 5 Sean Cox 4 Grant Gilchrist 3 Geoff Cross 2 Ross Ford 1 Allan Jacobsen

16 Andy Titterrell 17 John Yapp 18 Willem Nel 19 Perry Parker 20 Netani Talei 21 Chris Leck 22 Gregor Hunter 23 Sep Visser

Cardiff Blues
Tries Cuthbert x 1
Pens Halfpenny x 4
Con Halfpenny x 1
D/G

Edinburgh
Tries Penalty Try x 1 / Visser x 1
Pen Laidlaw x 2
Con Laidlaw x 1
D/G Laidlaw x 1

Yellow Cards Josh Navidi x1 Greig Tonks x1