Brendan Gallagher reviews the intriguing background to next Saturday’s big match

IT possibly won’t surprise you that Clermont –who took 99 years to land their first French Championship and who are almost defined by their dogged pursuit of a first European Cup – is where the Crusades all started. No seriously.
For Clermont this crusade business began back in 1095 after a famous call to arms by Pope Urban ll in the city’s cathedral after which the forces of Christendom soon gathered at Clermont and marched off to the Middle East in an attempt to free Jerusalem fr...