Petr Cech, at 26 years of age, is just two games from a half-century of Champions League appearances. His experience of the competition means he can understand what to expect from CFR Cluj on Wednesday night.

The Group A game in Romania pits the club with the highest Uefa ranking before the draw was made with the club with the fourth lowest. Already Cluj's win in Rome has swept aside any complancy there might have been among the other teams in the group, and the Chelsea keeper can recall seven seasons ago when he was playing for an unfancied side against European football's most successful giant.

'Being a team which is unknown, you always want to go out and show everyone you are not only a team for one season or that you have miraculously progressed to the group stage,' Cech says.

'I remember when I was in Sparta Prague and we played Real Madrid. We knew if we fought and kept organised, we had a chance.

'In the end it was a brilliant game, we lost 3-2 but deserved a point from the game.'

Indeed the teenage Cech's side were drawing until the 74th minute when Fernando Morientes scored the winner for the Spaniards in Prague. This was the season when Claude Makelele, Zinedine Zidane, Figo, Raul and co. went on to lift the European Cup.

'It was a huge motivation to show we are a good team,' continues Cech.

'The second motivation is that you can play for the glory. No-one expects you to beat them so you can go and enjoy it, play your best without any pressure which is a great situation.'

Cech is also able to draw parallels with a recent Chelsea experience to warn his team-mates to be totally focussed on the task in hand in Romania.

'This is Cluj's first ever Champions League appearance at home and I remember two years ago when we played Levski Sofia it was the same case. We won 3-1 but it was difficult and we had to be on top of our game to win.'

On that occasion a Didier Drogba hat-trick won the group stage away match in Bulgaria.

'I expect the same this time because having beaten Roma away 2-1, this is the driving force for the Cluj team so we try to make sure we are ready for them.

'They are well organised and they had a plan against Roma which worked well. I could see that they tried to shoot a lot of attempts from everywhere. Any possibility to attack to score a goal, they take their chance so this is a main danger,' reckons Cech who is feeling good given Chelsea's results this season.

'When you are wining games, you go into every game with the confidence that you will play well and if you keep working hard, you have a big chance to win. This will be the case tomorrow but we have to respect the opponent and know there is different circumstances here.'