The Blues, who qualified for the Amlin Challenge Cup quarter-finals as one of the three Heineken Cup Pool runners-up, booked their place in the last four with a commanding seven-try 55-20 victory at Newcastle Falcons.
Now they face more English opposition when they take on London Wasps at Adams Park on Saturday evening, the teams having met only once before in Europe, the Blues winning 26-24 at Wasps in the Pool stages of the 1996/97 Heineken Cup.
“We want to get as far as we can in any European tournament – it doesn’t matter whether it is the Heineken Cup or Amlin Challenge Cup,” said Rees. “We just happen to be in the Amlin and we will give it our best shot.
“And naturally we are all looking forward to the semi-final. A lot of our internationals are back and we’ve enjoyed the performances and results of the last month.
“It will be an exciting occasion at Adams Park and it should be a good day.”
The Blues have an exceptional record against English clubs over the last two seasons with Heineken Cup wins over Harlequins and Gloucester – both doubles – and Sale Sharks plus victories elsewhere over Leicester Tigers, Bath Rugby and Northampton Saints.
“We are happy to play another English opponent, we have played well against the English sides in the past couple of seasons,” added Rees.
“We like to play the English, play some rugby and hopefully we can do the same against Wasps because we really do want to be in the Amlin Challenge Cup final.
“We are Wales’ last hope in Europe this season but we want to reach the final for ourselves as a squad, just like last year.
“We managed that last season by winning the EDF final and that was a good day. There are some of the lads in the squad leaving this summer and we want to do it for them so we will give it our all in the semi-final.”
Among those departing are former captain Xavier Rush and the former All Blacks contribution to the Blues cause over his time with the Welsh region warrants him signing off in style before he links up with Ulster Rugby next season.
Rees has also played in the Heineken Cup for the Ospreys and London Irish and sized up the Wasps challenge when they played London Irish in the Premiership.
“I haven’t seen a great deal of Wasps but I did see them against London Irish a couple of weeks ago – although I was watching more for how my old team-mates were getting on,” he said.
“However, Joe Simpson has been getting some good reviews for Wasps and I’m really looking forward to possibly playing against someone new and different. He has been playing well in the Guinness Premiership so I am sure there will be good competition between us if it happens.
“As for ourselves, the boys have been playing well and Casey Laulala and Taufa’ao Filise have been our stand-out players in the last couple of weeks. “We got a good result against the Dragons, the players got more game-time and hopefully we are ready for the game against Wasps.”
