GLASGOW WARRIORS ace Jon Welsh admits a fear of losing will drive him on in his bid for 1872 Cup success this Friday night.

The Scotstoun tight head is plotting a course for BT Murrayfield in the maiden fixture of the new year as Glasgow go into the clash on the back of a first leg 16-6 victory over Edinburgh.

Saturday's encounter was far from a classic as both teams cancelled each other out for large spells of the game.

It is something Welsh believes reflects the respect for the fixture in that each set of players knows how painful the agony of defeat is.

And looking towards the second leg, the 28-year-old says Glasgow will continue to take such a stern approach to the tie at the national stadium.

He said: "We're always confident and you never think you're going to stroll a game.

"So I think there is always the fear of losing if you want to put it like that.

"We do a lot of analysis from team stuff to individual players so we look at what we'll need to work on in training and we'll take that into the game at the weekend.

"We'll be confident, we know where we need to do our work. Edinburgh really came at us. We talked about how physical it was in the contact area, they were very good at slowing the ball down.

"They have very good players and we all know them from Scotland camp and things like that."

Welsh added: "We've looked at everything we need to address.

"There's still training to be done this week, but we know where we need to do our work. You saw how physical and competitive the game was at the breakdown, that's a focus for us as it will be for Edinburgh."

As well as being a cagey affair, it was also a heated one at Scotstoun with former Rangers manager Ally McCoist watched on from the stand.

One of the main flash points came when Edinburgh's Ross Ford appeared to clash with Glasgow captain Al Kellock, with some reports claiming the Murrayfield man appeared to throw a punch at his rival.

It is something Welsh was quick to shrug off.

He said: "I don't mind a bit of that!

"If there is one guy I'd have chosen to punch - not in a bad way - it will be Al, I know he can handle himself. It's not his first rodeo and he had his hands up straight away!

"But listen, it just shows the competitiveness that the game brings out of everyone.

"We are all friends off the pitch but that's put aside for the 80 minutes.

"Afterwards we will get something to eat, have a drink and a chat. All the bad blood gets left on the pitch."

Recalling his own scrapes, Welsh added: "Probably from my boxing days. I've been caught a few times in the ring.

"On the pitch it's not really happened. Maybe when I was at Whitecraigs when I was younger, those days seems to be a bit more frantic.

"With the professional game, if you throw a punch it's bad for the team. If you get a yellow your team-mates are suffering, so you need to keep your cool."