The Blues meet a Reds outfit heavily favoured to progress to next weekend's season decider, the home side having won the minor premiership and enjoyed the week off in the first stage of the finals.
They will also be playing in front of a predicted sell-out crowd at Lang Park of around 52,000, which will be a Super Rugby record.
While the Reds are favourites with the bookmakers, the All Blacks-laden Blues are not without their chances.
They led the competition during a nine-match unbeaten run and had their opportunities to beat the Reds when they met at Lang Park back in round 13 before going down 37-31 to the hosts.
Nevertheless, Lam is quite content to push the line that the Reds are in the box seat, although he is mindful they faltered when they last won a Super Rugby minor premiership.
The Reds led the overall standings following the regular season in 1999 and hosted the fourth-placed Crusaders in their semi-final at Ballymore, only to fall 28-22 to the eventual champions.
"It's been 12 long years between four beating one and everything is pointing to a Reds' victory," Lam told Grandstand.
"They've had the week off, they're on momentum, sold-out crowd, but that is what is so good about rugby.
"It's on the day, it's the contest. For us we're just so happy to be here and we're going to give it everything we can and we're really looking forward to the challenge."
The fact the two sides have already met this season has given the Blues more than some idea of what to expect from the Reds and they took several lessons away from the defeat.
Improving their start have been given priority, as they let the Reds run out to a 24-0 lead during the first half before playing themselves back into the contest to trail 27-14 at the break.
Lam says his troops will be keeping this firmly in mind on Saturday night.
"You learn more from your losses and obviously the biggest one for us is getting off to a better start than we did," he said.
Big match experience
Saturday night will be the Reds' first play-offs appearance since 2001 and only three of their matchday squad - Radike Samo (Brumbies, 2004), Beau Robinson (Waratahs, 2008) and Guy Shepherdson (Brumbies, 2004) - have previously played in the finals with other provinces.
Lam feels the Blues will not be able to exploit their opponents' lack of finals experience, highlighting that they have played in a series of blockbuster matches during the season such as their thrilling 17-16 win over the Crusaders in May.
"It doesn't matter because at the end of the day finals rugby is about big games and they've played a lot of big games," he said.
"Super Rugby, even when you go the Africa ... there's some massive games there, so they're the experiences you draw from and ultimately when you get to the finals rugby it's about the best teams.
"The four teams left have shown quality right through the season, as far as teamwork goes ,and that's what it is going to come down to."
Meanwhile, Lam has opted to start Lachie Munro ahead of Rene Ranger on the wing.
Ranger, who has recovered from a hamstring injury, had been bracketed with Munro but will not be a fresh reserve, while James King and Sherwin Stowers have also been confirmed to take their place on the bench.
The Blues will be without All Blacks lock Anthony Boric because of a foot injury and his place in the second row has been taken by Chris Lowrey.
Tags: sport, rugby-union, super-14, brisbane-4000, new-zealand First posted July 1, 2011 18:21:00
