'Not at full strength' Bristol brace for giants they 'have never played'

Pat Lam admits that the odds are stacked against his injury-hit Bristol Bears squad going to runaway Top 14 leaders Toulouse in the Champions Cup on Saturday and returning with a quarter-final spot in the bag.

Toulouse have proved to be in a league of their own on home soil this season, scoring 40 or more points ten times, including a 77-7 win over the Bears’ Gallagher PREM rivals earlier in the year.

The 2024 Champions Cup winners are 12 points clear of the field in the Top 14 table and have a points difference of +357, but have never played a club game against the Bears, and Lam says they have to back themselves.

“This is the biggest competition in the Northern Hemisphere. That’s why you want to be in it. And if you’re in it, you’ve got to back yourself to win it. And that was our mentality in the pool stages.

“You know, you do all the hard work the year before to qualify and then get there, and we’re going as strong as we possibly can be with the guys injured to try and win this game.

Fixture

Investec Champions Cup

Toulouse

09:30

4 Apr 26

Bristol

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“But the odds are stacked against us, and in the history of Bristol, we have never played Toulouse, and when you consider who Toulouse are, what they’ve done and the club that they are, it’s a massive privilege for us to go and play them.

“We are going to find out where we are against them, albeit not at full strength,” Lam told RugbyPass on his Thursday afternoon media call.

Lam has tasted success in the European Cup as a player, captaining Northampton to victory 26 years ago when they beat Munster 9-8 at Twickenham, but, like the Bears, he never played against Les Rouges et Noirs.

“I played against a few of the French teams but never against Toulouse. The only time I ever came close was when I was at Northampton.

“We thought we were going to play them when they were the favourites to beat Munster. And Munster beat them in the Heineken Cup semi-final in 2000. And we played Munster in the final instead of Toulouse,” he adds.