Will Greenwood: This Heineken Cup Final is going to be absolutely explosive

Morgan Parra will be pulling the strings for Clermont

Betfair Ambassador Will Greenwood is tremendously excited ahead of the Heineken Cup Final between Clermont and Toulon at the Aviva Stadium this Saturday tea time...

And so it comes to this. After seven months of at times breathtakingly good rugby, we're left with two teams ready to battle it out at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin for the chance to call themselves Heineken Cup champions. Two teams that have never even graced this final before, let alone won the competition.

Clermont v Toulon has been, to my mind, unfairly billed as a possible descent into a tit-for-tat kickfest, Morgan Parra's boot against Jonny Wilkinson's, a battle to see who can send the ball flying through the posts the most amount of times. I disagree.

In short, I have never been as excited about a rugby game not containing an English side in all my life. I'm a long-term admirer of Clermont's aesthetic, their fans and how they play the game. If you're a rugby fan that's never visited the Parc des Sports Michel Michelin, I can't recommend it enough, it's a near religious experience. Clermont are a superb club, they've produced some great coaches, club captain Aurelien Rougerie's mother is the mayor of Clermont and when those drums beat in the stadium, it is an experience like nothing else in the sport. What's not to like?

On Saturday, we'll have my favourite team ever against Jonny's team and I could not be looking forward to it more.

As for the game itself, I feel like I could write a thousand words on each head-to-head alone, but I'll spare you and me the time and effort that would take! One thing we know for sure is that the first ten minutes will be absolutely key to everything that follows. Both teams have had a good rest before the final, so energy levels will be high, especially early on. 

Clermont only know one way to start a game and that's to fly out of the blocks. Those early scrums will be seismic and Toulon will need to stay in touch and focus on matching their opponents in those early exchanges. In the shape of Jonny Wilkinson, they have the biggest of big game players, and he will be at the centre of everything they do. So far, he's had a brilliant tournament and I wouldn't bet against him writing the headlines one more time.

Let's talk about important areas then. The first one that will be vital to win is the line out. I expect Toulon to go with Nick Kennedy because they'll be worried about Clermont's prowess. Julien Bonnaire is a one man lineout; front, middle, or back. The man is a sensation when it comes to the set piece aerial battle and Kennedy has to have the game of his life to provide Toulon with a platform and try and disrupt the Clermont loving relationship with the touchline and the ensuing lineouts.

Pretty obvious, but the scrum will be another battle that is of paramount importance to win. It'll be massive. Look at all those big guys in that pack: Bakkies Botha, Andrew Sheridan for Toulon, as well as Carl Hayman, against Nathan Hines, Thomas Domingo, Jamie Cudmore for Clermont. It's clearly going to be some clash. Clermont may rule the airwaves but Toulon will go after them in the scrum.
 
Moving to the back of the scrum and the string-pullers at scrum half, Morgan Parra of Clermont is the more intelligent of the two. He is simply a master craftsman. His opposite number Tillous-Borde is all about power. The Toulon man needs to tighten up and cut down his high error rate on Saturday. He was poor in the semi-final, it was like he had somebody else's radar on. He knows that, in Dublin, one misplaced pass and Clermont will eat Jonny Wilkinson, the receiver of his passes, alive.

In this final, I think Clermont need to be more than ten points clear at half time. If they can't break free and get more than ten points ahead after a start that will surely be explosive, I can see Jonny kicking Toulon to a comeback victory. Look at Clermont's semi-final last year against Leinster: they couldn't shake the Irishmen off and eventually succumbed. It almost happened again against Munster this year. They were hanging on by their fingernails in the end. Toulon are more than capable of making Clermont pay via Wilkinson's boot.

Recommended Bets

Clermont/Toulon in the Half Time/Full Time market is a richly priced 8.27/1. Given what's gone on in the past, I think that looks an excellent bet.

Also, I'm so convinced of a good start from Clermont that I like the look of Clermont Penalty in the First Scoring Play market at an odds against price of 2.245/4.