France wing Vincent Clerc is expected to be out for up to six months after rupturing ligaments in his left knee.

Clerc collapsed without being touched during Toulouse’s defeat to Clermont on Saturday, with TV replays showing his knee moving out of its socket.

He will now miss his side’s Heineken Cup semi-final clash with London Irish next Saturday, 26 April, and France’s two-Test summer tour of Australia.

Clerc starred for France in last year’s World Cup and this year’s Six Nations.

He has scored 20 tries in 33 games for Les Tricolores.

Toulouse ended Welsh interest in the Heineken Cup with a fine quarter-final display to beat Cardiff Blues.

The Welsh visitors gifted a try to Maxime Medard in the first minute and were then always chasing the game.

A Jason Spice try, later sin-binned as was Toulouse’s Cedric Heymans, kept the Blues in touch at half-time 16-10 down.

But Toulouse marched away after the break with Maleli Kunavore, Vincent Clerc and Jean Bouilhou tries, although Ben Blair scored a Blues consolation.

With the Ospreys having lost at Saracens earlier on Sunday in their quarter-final, the Blues took the field at Le Stadium as the last standard-bearers of Welsh hopes in Europe.

But whatever game plan the Blues arrived with was blown within the first minute as Toulouse scored a breakaway try.

Tom Shanklin’s attempted grubber under pressure was seized at point-blank range by Kunavore, allowing the Fijian to kick deep into unguarded Blues territory.

Medard had too much of a head-start on Blues wing Tom James and the Toulouse speedster gathered the bouncing ball to go under the posts.

Jean-Baptiste Elissalde stroked the comfortable conversion and soon added a penalty when Maama Molitika carelessly detached too early from a scrum.

Blues could have been forgiven for letting their heads drop, especially when Blair missed an eighth-minute penalty kick that might have helped steady nerves.

But the Welsh showed why they have reached the quarter-finals this season for the first time since becoming a regional side.

A flowing backs move saw James on the left wing show great strength to duck inside Medard and feed Shanklin on his right shoulder.

The Wales centre was brought down just short but scrum-half Spice was on hand to dive over from the ruck, Blair adding the extras to narrow the deficit to 10-7.

Elissalde replied with his second penalty but Toulouse then nearly gifted the visitors a try when Heymans’ quick line-out went horribly wrong.

Jamie Roberts got to the ball first and popped a pass to Shanklin, who could not avoid stumbling over his own wing as he went for the try line.

Heymans then killed the ball at the resulting ruck in his haste to atone, earning a yellow card and gifting three points to the boot of Blair.

Back came Toulouse and from the restart the charging French pack gathered for Elissalde to arrow over a cheeky drop-goal and a 16-10 lead.

Before half-time the Blues also suffered a sin-binning, when Spice had a kick charged down and like Heymans compounded the mistake by rushing back to kill the ball.

After the incident-packed first period, the second half started out of character with an attritional struggle in no-man’s land.

Toulouse finally broke through thanks to Elissalde, the France half-back adding a penalty before dummying a drop-goal and breaking down the right.

Heymans provided the link and Kunavore rounded the despairing cover to go under the posts for another seven-pointer.

A twin Blues substitution saw the Robinson brothers, Nick and Jamie, take the field and the pair combined brilliantly to send Blair over, the full-back converting his try.

But any hopes of a recovery were soon snuffed out, as rampaging lock Patricio Albacete punched a huge hole in the Welsh defence that gave Clerc acres of space to add Toulouse’s third try.

Elissalde stroked a fine conversion as his final act, leaving the field to a standing ovation with the game won as Valentin Courrent was given the last eight minutes.

Fellow replacement Bouilhou underlined Toulouse’s superiority with another try, and Heymans with a drop-goal, as the French advanced to meet London Irish at Twickenham in the semi-finals.

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Toulouse: C Heymans; V Clerc, M Kunavore, Y Jauzion, M Medard; J-B Elissalde, B Kelleher; D Human, W Servat, S Perugini, F Pelous (capt), P Albacete, Y Nyanga, T Dusautoir, S Sowerby.
Replacements: V Courrent for Elissalde (73), J Bouihlou for Nyanga (57). Not Used: A Vernet-Basualdo, J Poux, R Millo-Chlusky, M Ahotaeiloa, G Lamboley.

Sin Bin: Heymans (27).

Blues: B Blair; J Roberts, T Shanklin, G Thomas, T James; D Flanagan, J Spice; G Jenkins, G Williams, T Filise, D Jones, P Tito, M Molitika, M Williams, X Rush (capt).
Replacements: S Morgan for Tito (52), N. Robinson for Flanagan (60), J. Robinson for Shanklin (60). Not Used: Yapp, R. Thomas, White, Rees.

Leicester ground out an important victory against French giants Toulouse at a boggy Welford Road to keep their Heineken Cup Pool Six hopes alive.

Valentin Courrent landed a penalty to put Toulouse ahead before the Tigers hit back through Ollie Smith’s try.

Two Andy Goode penalties to a penalty and a drop-goal from Courrent meant Leicester led 11-9 after 55 minutes.

Goode made sure of victory with a 72nd minute penalty, but Toulouse went home with an important losing bonus point.

With Leicester having lost away to Leinster in their opening match in the competition they can ill-afford to lose any of their home games and they needed all their traditional grit to see off Pool Six leaders Toulouse.

The French side may have an impressive pack but what they are really renowned for is their free-flowing style, while Leicester’s traditional gameplan is more robust.

With heavy rain having made the Welford Road pitch very boggy it suggested the visitors might take a more conservative approach than usual but there was no sign of that when the game started.

The visitors, the only three-time winners of the competition, launched two scything counter attacks in the first five minutes and their early pressure paid off when Courrent edged them into the lead with a penalty.

The French giants were trying to play the game at pace but it cost them dear when Clement Poitrenaud panicked when he was tackled in his 22 after the visitors took a quick throw-in.
The exciting Toulouse backs rarely broke free from the Tigers’ defence 

Smith, playing out of position on the wing, picked up the full-back’s loose pass superbly on the run and had the pace to beat the cover and cross out wide, with Goode narrowly unable to add the conversion.

As the half wore on Leicester’s power game saw them secure the upper hand in the territorial battle and they gained their reward through a Goode penalty.

But when the French visitors managed to establish a beachhead in the Tigers’ half Courrent popped over a drop-goal to ensure they only trailed 8-6 at the break.

With the pitch cutting up and the ball very greasy the match had become increasingly attritional as the half wore on but Toulouse sparked back into life immediately after the restart.

When a cheeky pass from replacement Tigers scum-half Ben Youngs failed to go to hand the French side countered with a superb flowing attack.

Leicester had to infringe to bring it to a halt and Courrent made no mistake to put the visitors back into the lead.

However, Toulouse kept playing themselves into trouble and when Vincent Clerc threw a suicidal pass Courrent held on at the resulting ruck and Goode kicked the Tigers back into the lead.

The fly-half added another penalty inside the final 10 minutes but the hosts had a huge scare when Clerc was called back for a forward pass as he cruised round under the posts.

They might not have sneaked victory at the death but Toulouse did manage to stay within seven points to claim what could be a vital losing bonus point in a very tight group.

Leicester travel to Toulouse next week for a rematch which will go a long way to deciding who qualifies for the knock-out stages.

Byron Kelleher is one of the world class players poised to make his Heineken Cup debut in Round 1 of the 13th season of the tournament – and the All Blacks scrum half is itching to face Edinburgh in the Scottish capital on Saturday, 10 November.

 
And while the triple Heineken Cup winners and Edinburgh are regular tournament opponents – this will be the 10th time they have collided – it is all brand new for Toulouse’s big name signing.
“The rugby in Europe is quite different to back home,” said Kelleher. “In New Zealand the rugby is a lot faster, but up here it’s a lot more physical and when it comes to the atmosphere, although the crowds aren’t always as big as you’d get back home, they make just as much noise. Playing in front of a big crowd over here must be absolutely amazing and something I’m looking forward to.

“I’ve watched a bit of Top 14 and have seen that there are some different styles of play, but Toulouse play a really similar style to the All Blacks, they like to keep the ball alive and playing all over the park and that’s something I’m really looking forward to doing.

“The Heineken Cup gets far more publicity in New Zealand than the Top 14, and for anyone who plays a lot of rugby in New Zealand they are inspired to play by the players in the Heineken Cup.

“I’m really looking forward to playing in it and now I’ve got one game under my belt and another one this weekend I should have settled in nicely before the Heineken Cup starts – I want to play well for the team and I want Toulouse to win the competition.

“With all the technology available to us these days It doesn’t take much to find out about the other teams in our pool. I’ve studied these teams before and I watched a lot of the Heineken Cup in New Zealand before I moved over and I know we’ve got three really tough teams in our group.

“Obviously I know a lot of the players through international rugby and I know the quality that all three sides have in their squads. Having said that, I want us to be real contenders in the Pool stages and, hopefully, earn a home quarter-final and then anything can happen.

“I guess the thing I’m really excited about is the atmosphere and the ambience which is around the ground. The fans here are really something special and, although we have great supporters back in New Zealand, the supporters here are really fanatical about their rugby and their teams.

“It’s really exciting being here. Like anything in life, things can get a bit stale and I find that I play my best rugby when I change things. I did that when I played for Otago. It started getting a bit stale living in the same place and playing for the same team and it was just a routine and there wasn’t much excitement so I changed the team and the atmosphere and it just grew my rugby.

“So, after playing many years of Southern Hemisphere rugby, I decided that it’s time for me to move on and set myself new goals and challenge myself outside New Zealand.

“That’s what I’m doing here and I can’t wait to get stuck in and particularly playing Heineken Cup. It’ll take me a month or so to really get into the routine and once I’ve conquered that I’ll be able to really get on top of my rugby.”