It is easy to get seduced by the sheer exoticism of a club like Toulouse, according to the Daily Telegraph's Mick Cleary.
"The Heineken Cup champions boast a Michelin-starred clubhouse restaurant, extravagant clothing boutiques, blue-chip sponsors and of course glamourpuss players such as Frédéric Michalak.
If you want a true insight as to why Toulouse will once again start this Heineken Cup campaign as one of the front-runners then look no further than the twitchy, fretful, stubbled-chinned, slightly down-at-heel head coach, Guy Novès.
He never rests, he never lets us rest," says Michalak, Toulouse's pin-up fly-half. "He is competitive in his very being, and that is why we are too. He is never satisfied. Believe me, never."
There are echoes of Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson in Novès's relationship with Toulouse. In fact, the umbilical cord cuts even deeper given that the wiry Novès was once a wing for Toulouse, one who won two French titles. But the passion, the urgency, the relentlessness, the bottled-up rage that Ferguson brings to the task is also the hallmark of Novès."
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