The two Guinness Premiership sides, London Irish and Saracens, play the biggest ever matches in their club's history this weekend as they look to make it to the Heineken CUp Final in Cardiff next month.

Full details of London Irish v Toulouse below

For details of the Saracens v Munster match click here

Heineken Cup Semi-Final

London Irish v Toulouse Saturday 26^th April 3pm Twickenham

Current Form

·        London Irish started this season at Twickenham with a Guinness Premiership match against Harlequins and they will be returning on Saturday to face Toulouse in the semi-final of the Heineken Cup in what is probably the biggest game in the club’s history.

·        Despite dominating possession and territory, London Irish made hard work of beating Harlequins last Saturday. They wore them down in the final quarter to win 13-6 and kept alive their extremely slim hopes of qualifying for this season’s Premiership play-offs.

·        They are now 7^th in the table but are 10 points behind 4^th placed Harlequins with only 2 matches left to play.

·        Toulouse lost at home to Clermont Auvergne last Saturday which is an extremely unusual occurrence. They are now second in the French Top 14, 5 points behind leaders Clermont Auvergne after 18 of 26 rounds.

Heineken Cup 2007/2008

·        London Irish qualified for the Heineken Cup semi-finals for the first time with an excellent 20-9 victory against Perpignan at the Madejski Stadium in front of a crowd of 16048. This was their best ever attendance in the Heineken Cup, previously 14675 against Ulster in December 2006.

·        They qualified for the quarter-final stage as a result of finishing top of Pool 1 with 24 points and they were 2^nd seeds. They scored 182 points and conceded 100 and the 25 tries they scored was the 2^nd highest in the competition.

·        The 7 tries London Irish scored in their first Pool match against Benetton Treviso was the most they have ever scored in a Heineken Cup match beating the 5 they scored against Newport in 2002/2003. They then went on to score 6 tries in their next match after the Treviso game, also against Newport.

·        The 45 points London Irish scored at Newport in the second round of matches this season was their highest ever score in the Heineken Cup.

·        Peter Hewat has scored 90 points for London Irish in this season’s competition, second only behind Glen Jackson of Saracens.

·        His 6 conversions against the Dragons was a London Irish Heineken Cup record beating the 4 by Barry Everitt, also against Newport Gwent Dragons in 2002/03.

·        Peter Hewat and Tomas de Vedia have both scored 4 tries in this year’s tournament.

·        Toulouse moved into their 8^th Heineken Cup semi-final with a comfortable 41-17 beating of Cardiff at the Stade Municipal in front of a crowd of 35070, the biggest attendance at a Heineken Cup match this season.

·        They qualified for the quarter-finals of this year’s competition as the winners of Pool 6. They won 4 games from 6 played, losing to both Leicester and Leinster.

·        They scored 130 points in their 6 games and only Cardiff with 124, topped a Pool and scored less.

·        Jean-Baptiste Elissalde has scored 51 points in this season’s campaign and Valentin Courrent 35.

·        Jean-Baptiste Elissalde has now increased his Toulouse Heineken Cup record points haul to 367 and he is now the 10^th highest points scorer in Heineken Cup history.

·        Vincent Clerc has scored 5 tries in this season’s tournament to overtake Michel Marfaing as the top Toulouse try scorer in Heineken Cup history with 27. He is now only 2 tries behind the competition record holder Dafydd James who has scored 29.

·        Fabien Pelous beat Yannick Bru’s Toulouse Heineken Cup record of 64 appearances for the club in the Pool matches. He has now played 68 times for Toulouse and 5 times for Dax, with 73 appearances, the joint 4^th in the all time appearance list behind Munstermen Anthony Foley, John Hayes and Peter Stringer and level with Ronan O’Gara.

European History

·        This is only the 3^rd season that London Irish have qualified for the Heineken Cup. They have played 8 times in the European Challenge Cup.

·        London Irish have never won the European Challenge Cup but they came mightily close in 2006 when they were beaten 36-34 by Gloucester after extra time.

·        The London Irish coach in their first year in the European Challenge Cup in 1996/97 was Sir Clive Woodward.

·        In their previous 2 Heineken Cup tournaments London Irish failed to progress out of their pool.

·        They have played 10 Heineken Cup matches at home winning 8 and losing to Llanelli and Toulouse.

·        They have entertained French opposition 4 times, Toulouse and Perpignan twice, winning 3 and losing to Toulouse in 2006/2007.

·        London Irish met Toulouse in both their previous Heineken Cup campaigns. They have won 1 and lost 3. The 4 matches have certainly seen some points scored, 51, 61, 54 and 50, with 3 of the 4 matches being won by 5 points or less.

·        The exception was the match at Stade Ernest Wallon in October 2006 when London Irish suffered their worst ever defeat in the Heineken Cup, going down 37-17.

·        In the quarter-final match against Perpignan, Bob Casey played in his 13^th Heineken Cup match for London Irish beating the record of Barry Everitt.

·        Barry Everitt is the top points scorer for London Irish in the Heineken Cup with 111.

·        Delon Armitage is the only London Irish player to score a hat trick of tries in a match, against Newport Gwent Dragons in 2002/03.

·        Delon Armitage has now increased his London Irish Heineken Cup try scoring record to 8 this season.

·        London Irish backrower Phil Murphy played 14 times in the Heineken Cup for Perpignan, including the 2003 Heineken Cup final.

·        No London Irish player has ever been sent off in the Heineken Cup.

·        Toulouse are the only team in the history of the Heineken Cup to win it 3 times.

·        They were also beaten finalists to London Wasps in 2004.

·        Toulouse were the first ever winners of the Heineken Cup in 1996.

·        Jean-Luc Cester of Toulouse scored the first ever try in the Heineken Cup, against Romanian club Farul Constanta, in the first ever game on 31^st October 1995.

·        Philippe Carbonneau played for Toulouse in the first Heineken Cup final in 1996 and then played for Brive in 1997 and 1998. The only man to play in the first 3 finals.

·        12 other Toulouse players have played in a record 3 Heineken Cup finals.

·        Emile Ntamack is the only man to play in Heineken Cup finals 8 years apart.

·        Cedric Heymans has 3 Heineken Cup winners medals and played a total of 36minutes rugby. He was an unused replacement for Brive in 1997 and Toulouse in 2003, and came on in the 64^th minute against Stade Francais in 2005 in which 20 minutes extra time was played.

·        Only 3 players have collected Heineken Cup winners medals with different clubs, Carbonneau and Heymans (see above) and Federico Mendez with Bath in 1998 and Northampton in 2000.

·        Brothers Phillipe and Olivier Carbonneau both played for Toulouse in their 1996 Heineken Cup winning side.

·        Brothers Finau and Isitolo Maka both played for Toulouse in their 2005 Heineken Cup winning side.

·        Toulouse have played in the Heineken Cup in all 13 seasons since its inception.

·        They have played more matches, 92 than any other team.

·        They have won more matches, 65 than any other team.

·        With 715,850 Toulouse have had more people watch them at home in the competition than any other team.

·        Toulouse have played in England 14 times in the Heineken Cup winning 5 losing 8 and drawing 1.

·        In their first match in England in October 1996, Toulouse lost to Wasps at Loftus Road by a record  77-17.

·        They also lost to London Wasps the last time they played at Twickenham in the competition, in the 2004 Final.

·        In their last Pool game against Edinburgh, Toulouse became the first team in Heineken Cup history to reach the milestone of 300 tries. They have now scored 306.

·        Toulouse are the only team to have scored a century of points in a Heineken Cup match, when they beat Ebbw Vale 108-16 in 1998/99 and in the process scored a competition record 16 tries in a match.

·        Clement Poitrenaud was joint leading tryscorer in last season’s Heineken Cup with 7 tries.

·        Toulouse have played 45 matches at home in the Heineken Cup and only lost 6. They have only lost 2 of their last 28 matches in the competition going back to 2000/01.

·        Guy Noves has coached Toulouse every season since the inception of the Heineken Cup and is the only coach to win the cup 3 times.

·        Patrick Soula was the first Toulouse player to be sent off the field in the Heineken Cup, against Cardiff in October 1996.Cyril Vancheri in 1998 and Xavier Garbajosa in 2002 have also been sent off.