The Blues deserved to be in a buoyant mood after their 35-28 Super 12 rugby victory against the Cats.

A week after being booed from Eden Park in Auckland for their shoddy loss to the Stormers, the Blues had dealt with a trip to South Africa, the loss of more players and playing at altitude to find a rare win this season.

The style of the victory was nothing special, but it halted some of the bleeding which has weakened their campaign to defend the Super 12 title.

That chance remains, mathematically, but is highly unlikely as others searching for the final four continue to earn points.

"We got the victory but there is no great euphoria, we are not in that position in the competition," coach Peter Sloane said.

But after the trauma of last week, the Blues had to win to stall some of their demons.

"It is not really where we finish now," Sloane conceded, without entirely giving away a crack at the playoffs.

"It is all about how we finish this competition. We got the result here and it was important we enjoyed the occasion afterwards.

"This has been a very strange competition and who knows what will happen in the next few weeks. People say we could still make the four, that it could be on, but you have to wonder if that is realistic."

After a rare match without casualties, the Blues move to Durban where they will be joined by new father and five-eighth Carlos Spencer for this week's game against the Sharks.

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