If successful, the Vars, finalists of the competition in 2010, 2012, 2020 and 2022, can join the English clubs of Bath (Challenge Cup 2008, Champions Cup 1998), Wasps (Challenge 2003, Champions 2004, 2007) and Northampton (Challenge 2009, 2014, Champions 2000) or the Irish Leinster (Challenge 2013, Champions 2009, 2011, 2012, 2018) among the few teams to have won both continental competitions. The RCT would be the first French club to achieve such a feat.
Because Toulon and Europe is a great story: the club of the Rade won the moon in the Champions Cup during its three finals of rank 2013, 2014, 2015.
Ten years and one day after his first title, already in Dublin, Pierre Mignoni's men have the opportunity to close the circle by winning the "small" European Cup.
"Rehashing the past is never very good: lost finals are not an emotional factor at all. It's completely different. We are focused on this final to win it," said Var scrum-half Baptiste Serin.
"The goal is to win the cup. It leads to qualification for the Champions Cup but I think that for the whole group, to improve the work for some time and also pay for all the efforts made by everyone, the important thing is to bring back a title," he added.
Winning is -obviously- also a goal for Glasgow: only the second Scottish team to reach the Challenge final, after Edinburgh in 2015, the Warriors can become the first to win a continental title.
Charles Ollivon, Toulon's third line, pierces the La Rochelle defence on May 6, 2023 at the Stade Mayol stadium in Toulon © Christophe SIMON / AFP/Archives
"It will be a life-and-death match ... We have already played big games so I do not know if it will be the biggest but it will necessarily be one of the biggest matches in the history of the club, "said the second line of the Warriors Richie Gray, passed by Castres and Toulouse.
One thing is certain: on Friday night, it is a novice who will succeed Lyon and add his name to the seventeen previous winners of the Challenge Cup.
© 2023 AFP