Chris Hewett offers his pool by pool form guide ahead of the latest Heineken Cup showdowns in The Independent.
"Damned clever, the Heineken Cup. Europe's premier club tournament launches itself in mid-autumn with a fanfare of trumpets and an entire season's worth of razzamatazz, yet it keeps its true nature hidden until the dark days of winter, when the contenders play a series of back-to-back matches that invariably dictate the future course of the competition.
"The central section of this season's pool stage begins tonight with Glasgow welcoming Toulouse, the champions, to the Arctic outpost of Firhill Stadium, but if the temperatures north of the border are at rock bottom, the mercury will rise very rapidly over the weekend when the leading clubs from four of the six pools meet in a series of highly significant contests."
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