The benefit of being seeded in the Heineken Cup finally proved advantageous to a Scottish side yesterday as Glasgow Warriors were given a much better chance of reaching the quarter-finals than their unseeded inter-city rivals.

The challenge facing Edinburgh is more like rugby's Dante's Inferno than your traditional "group of death", as they face the two most successful sides in the history of the competition.

What is remarkable is that, with five tournament triumphs between them and a combined total of eight appearances in the cup's 12 finals, neither three time champions Toulouse, nor Leicester, was the seeded side. That dubious honour falls to Leinster, highest finishers among the Irish sides in this season's Magners League.

Close to five months before the reality must be confronted, Lynn Howells, Edinburgh's head coach, yesterday made all the right noises after stifling a wry laugh following the draw in Cardiff, where the final will take place at the Millennium Stadium on May 24 or 25.

"They don't come much harder than that," he admitted. "However that's what this competition is all about and if you get through this group you'll have deserved it."

The Welshman's under- statement was right up there with the Monty Python character who, when visited by the Grim Reaper, oberved: "Well . . . that's cast rather a gloom over the evening, hasn't it?"

Yet Howells, whose squad will have been joined by Steve Larkham, one of the sport's greats, by the time the Heineken Cup gets under way, was his usual cheerful self in contemplating the prospect.

He observed that regardless of whether Larkham's Wallabies go the distance in the World Cup - it is scheduled for an October 20 finish - his Scottish internationalists will have had time to rest up following the tournament and before the first round of European matches.

Clearly he seemed to suggest he does not fancy Scotland's chances of reaching the final.

Questioned on that subject, he retorted quite reasonably: "They've got as good a chance as Wales."

Asked whether that was a better chance than Edinburgh have of reaching the quarter-finals, he became more serious, saying: "I wouldn't rule it out. If we play well on the day we should be in with a shout."

What ought to offer Edinburgh encouragement is that their best Heineken Cup run - when they advanced to the quarter-finals after beating Toulouse in their opening pool match - came immediately after the last World Cup.

Certainly the trip to Toulouse is now a familiar one, since they went there for pool matches and the quarter-final in that 2003/04 campaign, equalling four trips in all to the French city in the last five years.

They also beat Leinster at Murrayfield at home last year and Howells is understandably keen that his men get a home tie to open.

There was certainly a general sense déjà vu for the Scots, as reflected by the fact that, both sides used the phrase in their press releases yesterday.

There are no easy draws, but the Warriors got a break in being paired with the only Italian side they could meet, while their players know the other opponents well.

Saracens were the opposition in three matches in last season's European Challenge Cup and, while the Glasgow side failed to record a win in any of those, only seven points in total separated the sides across two defeats in Watford and the draw at Hughenden which got them into the last eight.

Meanwhile, Warriors have recruited several players from the disbanded Border Reivers - who came close to creating the biggest upset in Heineken Cup history last season when they led late on in Biarritz.

"There are no easy pools in the Heineken Cup and we have been looking forward to it, no matter who we were going to be drawn against," said Sean Lineen, Warriors' head coach.

"We now know Saracens pretty well but that works both ways of course. Biarritz will be a massive challenge and Viadana are an exciting prospect."

Perhaps the man with most cause to have a smile on his face was Ian Riddoch who, on his first official duty as Warriors interim general manager, was with his former boss Alex Carruthers, Edinburgh's chairman at the draw, and knows he has been given a bit of a marketing gift.

"This is an excellent draw for us," he said. "For the supporters, there is the prospect of fantastic trips to Italy and France and, while I don't want to say we're going to do this, that and the next, we've got a real chance of doing something with a more robust team than last season."