Jeux sans frontiers! Saracens V Clermont Auvergne preview
By The Bard
April 5 2012
Those were the days; Stuart Hall, Eddie Waring, Arthur Ellis and his dipstick, the Fil Rouge….Anyway, it is indeed now a knockout for these two teams as there is no consolation prize for the loser. The winner on the other hand will get a home-land semi and with it the chance to go for glory.
Heineken Cup Pedigree
For two such high profile teams, the pedigree is more like a scruffy mongrel than a Crufts champion in Europe’s premier club competition. We have only made it out of the group stages once, and having seen off the Ospreys at Watford (more of that later) came within an ace of downing eventual champions Munster at the Ricoh Arena.
Our guests have fared even worse, with only a solitary quarter final appearance to their name. They too came agonisingly close to felling an Irish giant, going down 29-28 to Leinster at the RDS in 2009.
Their European highlight was winning the Challenge Cup in 2007, when they beat Bath 22-16 at the Stoop, who themselves had reached the final after beating us in a thrilling semi at Vicarage Road.
Domestic Form
As in Europe, there is very little to separate the teams. Despite appearing in 10 previous finals, Clermont did not get to lift the French crown until their eleventh attempt in 2010. This season, like us they are sat in second place and also lost their last game narrowly!
But unlike us, with a pack breathing down our neck, they sit a comfortable 11 points clear of Toulon. The highlight of their season was a recent 35-5 thumping of league leaders Toulouse. If only!
Clermont Squad
Yet again, like Sarries, the recent success of Clermont has seen a number of their players promoted to the French national team. Most prominent has been Wesley Fofana who burst on to the international stage with a clutch of tries. Whilst he may lack the bulk of Manu Tuilagi, he certainly seems to make progress each time he gets the ball and his battle with Brad Barritt will be one of the keys to the match.
Alongside him could well be the rather more experienced and larger Aurelien Rougerie, who is well up the all-time top try scorers list in Europe. As a complete aside, I discovered that the top all-time Challenge Cup try scorer is none other than our erstwhile winger Richard Haughton!
Julien Malzieu also had a run of games on the wing in this years 6N, before losing his squad place to colleague Jean Marcel Buttin. Conducting the backline will be Morgan Parra, an archetypal French scrum-half who also kicks; but is subjected to the constant indecision of the French management who cannot decide what their half-back pairing should be.
Not only do they boast this array of French internationals in the back-line, they also have All-Black Sitiveni Sivivatu to call on. After a very sluggish start to his career with Clermont, he is now showing signs of the talent that made him one of the most potent wingers on the planet. Chuck in Welsh exiles Lee Byrne and Regan King, Harry Potter look-a-like David Skrela and you have enough ingredients to cook up a very decent feast!
The pack also boasts a host of international experience, and a back-row containing Julien Bonnaire and Elvis Vermaelen is sure to test our stretched resources in that department. In front of them could well be Julien Pierre and Nathan Hines, with ex-premiership stars Benjami Kayser and Lionel Faure in the front row.
But forget all of the big names; the one player who constantly gets the headlines is Jamie Cudmore. If you could cross the worst parts of Jim Hamilton, Danny Grewcock and Danny Care you are still only half-way to creating Cudmore. As of January last year, he had accumulated 21 yellow cards and 3 reds, leading to bans including 70 days for stamping and 40 days for punching. One of those bans came for punching one our guys when the two sides met in France in 2010. He has probably thrown more punches on a rugby field than Audley Harrison has in a boxing ring!
Route to the QF
Clermont began their campaign with a narrow defeat at a resurgent Ulster, but soon found their stride putting Aironi and Leicester to the sword at the Stade Marcel Michelin. In the latter game Sunday’s ref Alain Rolland sin-binned two Tigers players in quick succession for dangerous play which effectively ended the game as a contest. I do hope and pray we are not discussing referees in the aftermath of Sunday!
Leicester gained some revenge the following week with a narrow win, but then followed one of those scores you have to look at a few times to make sure you have read correctly. I for one cannot think of a top-class rugby match where the home team lost 82-0, but this is precisely what happed when the hapless Aironi hosted Clermont. The group concluded with a narrow win for the French side against Ulster, enough to see them through as winners of pool four.
Sarries qualified as the slightly more comfortable winners of group five, although our Italian opponents put up a far sterner challenge in the away leg. The Biarritz and Ospreys teams were some way off their peaks of a few years ago, but were no pushovers nevertheless.
Previous encounter
The two teams also went head-to-head in the group stages of last year’s tournament. In the opening round match in France Alex Goode nearly scored the try of the season early on, but just failed to make the line and once Clermont got in front it was pretty much one-way traffic.
Come the return at Vicarage Road we were already out of the tournament, and a sleepy start saw us concede a try to Wesley Fofana in the second minute. A brief rally got us back into the game, but in truth 14-24 did not reflect our visitor’s superiority.
The 2008 QF
A couple of weeks after being humbled in the Anglo-Welsh Semi-final in Cardiff, the teams met again at Vicarage Road. Even though we were now into April, the morning of the match bought some snow and who will forget Sarrie the Camel riding around the pitch on a hovercraft?
We were soon trailing and it looked like another beating was in store, but the boys dug in and a couple of Glen Jackson penalties gave us a narrow half-time lead. Early in the second half a Jackson clearing kick was touched in flight, allowing Franny Lee to stay onside and race to the corner. A late Ospreys try ensured a nervy finish, but we held on with Richard Hill to the fore after managing to squeeze one last big-game out of his battered knees.
Only one Sarries player from that day is still in the squad. You’ll have to guess who!
In summary
On paper, it looks like we have no chance. Thankfully it is being played on grass, as was the recent match at the Stade de France when England beat France quite comfortably with several players from both sides on duty. How big an influence that will be on the psyche of the players will be very important. We certainly must scrummage better than we did against Quins, and play with a lot more physicality and intensity. It will be interesting to see if George Kruis gets to start at 6, as these are just the qualities he has delivered in abundance recently.
A fit-again Rhys Gill would provide better balance to the front row, while Mako Vunipola has showed very well in his recent return from injury and could just get a start. It would be a major surprise if we don’t see Charlie, Brad and Owen as 10,12 &13 so Chris Wyles will probably move to wing.
It should be an absolutely cracking contest, and I for one can’t wait!
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012:04:09:23:30:29 by Fozz1e.
One thing - believe Morgan Parra will be out for this one. Senio is a fine back-up - but Skrela and James are both capable of real off days...(touch wood)
We will here
and Morgan Parra will be OK !
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012:04:05:16:45:37 by greenday63.
GO SARRIES!!
That may be the only one of his former team-mates names who Tango-man still remembers. Blimey he really should!
thanks for the preview
Otherwise Hugh and kamelli were the only ones still around.
As I've said before, any similarities between people in my articles and those in real life are purely co-incidental!
Anyway, we've got Gill and Cudmore starting, how long before handbags and bar-stools start flying?
Quote:Sir Tease
Neil de Kock?
NDK was captain on that day , I have the photo of him leading the team out with my son, who was mascot for the day.