Euro fast facts
ASM Clermont Auvergne and RC Toulon will go head-to-head in the European Champions Cup Final at Twickenham on Saturday.
We bring you some interesting facts about the big day!
* RC Toulon could become the first club in European history, and only the second in the world game, to win a proper hat-trick of elite titles – three in successive seasons. They are in line to match the great Crusaders team of 1998-2000, who won the Super title three times in-a-row.
* ASM Clermont Auvergne and Toulon boast international players from 11 different countries.
* Mathieu Bastareaud is in line to play in his fifth successive European Final on Saturday. He was in the Stade Francais Paris side that lost to Harlequins in the 2011 Challenge Cup Final in Cardiff and he was on the losing team again with Toulon against Biarritz Olympique in 2012 at the Twickenham Stoop. But he made up for those two defeats with victory in the 2013 and 2014 European Cup finals. On Saturday he will be joining Steffon Armitage, Bakkies Botha, Juan Fernandez Lobbe, Matt Giteau, Carl Hayman, Maxime Mermoz, Jean-Charles Orioli, Jocelino Suta and Sebastien Tillous-Borde in chasing a record breaking third title win in a row.
* To date, players from 18 different countries have won a European Cup winners' medal. Bidding to extend that list this weekend will be Julien Bardy (Clermont and Portugal).
* Toulon utility back Frederic Michalak will be chasing a record equalling fourth winners' medal. The record is currently help by former Brive and Toulouse wing Cédric Heymans. Both men are among only five players who have won medals with two clubs. The double-club winners are:
Philippe Carbonneau – Toulouse 1996, Brive 1997
Cédric Heymans – Brive 1997, Toulouse 2003, 2005, 2010
Federico Mendez – Bath 1998, Northampton Saints 2000
Frederic Michalak – Toulouse 2003, 2005, RC Toulon 2013
Eoin Reddan – Wasps 2007, Leinster 2011, 2012
* World Cup-winners, Bakkies Botha and Ali Williams, as well as Toulon captain, Carl Hayman, will be playing in their last European game before hanging up their professional boots at the end of the season.
* Steffon Armitage, last season's European Player of the Year and one of five players shortlisted for the 2015 award, has been the king of the turnovers once again this season with 19 of Toulon's 78 in eight games. The reigning champions have also scored more points than any other team (238), while Clermont's Nick Abendanon has made more metres than any other player (761) and beaten 30 defenders from 95 carries.
* Clermont forwards coach Jono Gibbes is hoping to win the European Cup with a second club having held the same role at Leinster when they won the title in 2009, 2011 and 2012. Only Guy Noves (1996, 2003, 2005, 2010) has won more titles as a coach.
* Saturday's showpiece will be the fifth European Cup Final staged at Twickenham Stadium. A total of 528,809 fans have watched many of the world's finest players in action during Twickenham's dozen European Cup ties over the past 15 years since Northampton Saints pipped Munster 9-8 in the 2000 Final. The 81,774 crowd that saw the 2012 Final between Leinster and Ulster is a record for a European club Final.
* The match marks the first time the same two clubs have met in the Final and the fifth time two French teams have reached the decider. Toulon defeated Clermont in the 2013 Final in Dublin. There have been six occasions in the previous 19 finals when two clubs from the same country have met:
2003: Toulouse 22 Perpignan 17, Dublin
2005: Toulouse 18 Stade Francais Paris 12 (after extra time), Edinburgh
2007: Wasps 25 Leicester Tigers 9, Twickenham
2010: Toulouse 21 Biarritz Olympique 19, Paris
2012: Leinster 42 Ulster 14, Twickenham
2013: RC Toulon 16 ASM Clermont Auvergne 15, Dublin
* Clermont's Benjamin Kayser will be appearing in his fourth European Cup Final for three different clubs. He was on the losing side in 2005 with Stade Francais Paris and with Leicester Tigers in 2009, and once more with Clermont in 2013. Fourth time lucky?
Source: @ChampionsCup
