IF there is any member of the Newport Gwent Dragons team approaching Sunday’s Heineken Cup clash against Bath at the Recreation Ground with some trepidation, it won’t be James Arlidge.

For the outside half has not only played international rugby, albeit for Japan, but his second game in the southern hemisphere’s Super 14 competition was for the Blues against the Stormers in front of 45,000 people.

“It was a great experience, but we won the game,” he said. “I was extremely nervous and if it’s anything like that on Sunday then it’s going to be quite an experience as well.”

Arlidge will also come up against South African World Cup winner Butch James, but none of it will faze the New Zealander.

“Butch is a great player who has played a lot of Super 12 and Super 14 rugby and was a World Cup winner,” he acknowledged.

“I played against him five years ago in the Super 14 competition and he also defends well so he’s got a lot of strings to his bow.

“He may be going through a difficult spell with his goal kicking, but it’s not an easy job and most go through a bad patch at one time or another.

“But the way I work I don’t think about it or get too worried about the opposition, I prefer to think about the things I can control.

“We’re not kidding ourselves, we know it’s going to be a big challenge but we beat Glasgow without playing as well as we could. We let a few tries in and Bath will punish any mistakes we make, it’s about those little one per centres that can change a game.

“The hardest thing I find is the communication among the half backs, it’s the biggest distance on the field between players and the most vital as we often don’t hear the calls.”

Arlidge kicked 17 points against Glasgow from three penalties, two dropped goals and a conversion, putting him in third place among the leading Heineken Cup scorers after just one game - two behind Chris Malone of Harlequins and one behind David Skrela of Toulouse, both outside halves, and two ahead of Cardiff Blues full back Ben Blair and Clermont’s Australian fly half Brock James.

Explaining his dropped goals Arlidge said, “At the end of the first half against Glasgow our boys had got a good head of steam so it was a good time to drop a goal and then our forwards got us in a good field position so it was reasonable timing again.”