Champs happy to be heading home

Toulon skipper Jonny Wilkinson was delighted to see his team emerge from the mud and muck at Scotstoun with a victory on Saturday that clinched a home European Cup quarterfinal for the reigning champions.

Conditions were poor for a second time on the road in Pool Two for the French giants and once again Wilkinson's boot was the difference between the two teams as he picked up all the points to keep his team on course to retain the title they won in Dublin last year.

Toulon arrived in Scotland having already won the pool, but fully realising they needed to get the job done to bag a home quarterfinal at their spiritual home, Stade Mayol.

"We knew building up to it that it wasn't going to be like the dry sunshine in the south of France but we knew we had to come here and face up to it. Their ground was wet and that threw up a few questions for us but we had to fight at the end there," said Wilkinson.

"It's good to see a bit of spirit, holding on with some good defence. But you've just got to get a victory when you can. You get a feeling early on in the game of how it's going to go and you just try and find your way through to the end and find yourselves on the right side of the score line.

"We knew we had to come here and face up to it in defence, front up at the set piece and understand there would be a lot of selfless work off the ball especially in defence and try and stick together as a team.

"We try and keep our options open and play the game but as the game goes on you find it easier to push teams down into their own end and make them work out how to get out of there. It's a good victory, it provides relief and it will be a much happier flight home having got the win."