LONG READ Mick Cleary: 'Bath will be deflated but should be inspired to reach for even greater heights.'

Will the French ever be toppled? Or is the Champions Cup now their preserve, a rugby Bayeux Tapestry to be on display forever and a day as a monument to conquests across the continent? Leinster will have a word to say about that and as one-time supremacists themselves they are all too aware that the only thing certain about dynasty talk is that it comes back to bite you on the bum. At least the Irish province will be back to a happy hunting ground in Bilbao, the San Mames Stadium being the location of their last Champions Cup victory (over Racing 92) in 2018.

They know that they’ll need more than lucky charm happenstance to get the better of the defending champions, Union Bordeaux Begles, on May 23.^. The French side may not have been at their absolute swaggering best in beating Bath, and there was some focus on the baffling non-use of the TMO to consider possible sanction for high tackles on the charging, straggle-haired Alfie Barbeary, to prompt post-match chatter about the validity of the result. Well, let’s kill that one stone dead. UBB were justifiable and decisive winners. None of the three incidents was a clear-cut card even if the still photo of the irrepressible Maxime Lucu looks damning. EPCR would be wise to address several matters with the tournament and the use of the TMO, as well as the feed from the host broadcaster, which needs to be clear and transparent, with haste. Any delay does neither UBB or Bath justice.

Important as the matter is for the integrity of the competition, it is a complete sideshow as to the outcome of Sunday’s semi-final at the Stade Atlantique. Bordeaux were the better side and would have won no matter what. Bath had frailties in wide defence, at the lineout and in the taking of opportunities. But the sense of it all is that the French team had more power, more punch, more killer touch. And there is little end in sight to such French prowess.

This should be of concern to no-one but the killjoys and the dispossessed. Far better to revel in what is before us, to relish the balls-out instincts of a Matthieu Jalibert whose glorious eye for an opening would fit snugly into football team talks at PSG as they look to quell the equally attack-minded outlook of Bayern Munich. Jalibert is just one of the trigger points. Lucu – ‘the king of the Basque region’ – would be a certain starter for almost every other international team in the world. Playing second-fiddle to Antoine Dupont has only energised him, a creative dynamo in attack, a pest in defence and a dead-eyed kicker from hand and at goal. Cameron Woki ranks as a Jerome Kaino type figure in the back-row, the heart and soul of the forward effort, involved and galvanising, fierce yet precise. Woki almost bested Bath on his own albeit he had a monster helping hand in the latter stages from the talismanic ‘Big Ben’ Tameifuna. And if he doesn’t put you on your backside then the slicing potency of a Damian Penaud or Louis Bielle-Biarrey will do the job instead.

Saints and Bath are ahead of the domestic pack and it would be an upset of huge proportions if they were not to contest this season’s PREM final on June 20.

If UBB, or La Rochelle or Stade Toulousain, do dominate proceedings for the next decade then bring it on. It is up to others – as Bath themselves acknowledged in their dignified post-match response – to raise their game. There is no point at having some sort of equalising salary cap across the territories. Such restrictions are already in place in the various countries. And when it comes to the PREM, in particular, they ought to be punching harder. They have no representation in either the Champions or Challenge Cup final. It will be six years and counting since they troubled the trophy engravers in the Champions Cup. They’ve been close but beaten finalists as Northampton Saints were last year means no cigar and no claim on the PREM somehow being the best league in the world. Saints and Bath are ahead of the domestic pack and it would be an upset of sizeable proportions if they were not to contest this season’s PREM final on June 20.

But neither side yet looks capable of breaking the French stranglehold and until a Premiership club gets to the level of a Leicester or Wasps or Saracens of earlier vintages, when there was an expectation of being there to be beaten rather than just being in which a shout of European honours, then the PREM has to be seen as lacking in producing teams of the highest pedigree. The same is true of England in the test arena.

French rugby is a virtuous circle. There is more money, therefore greater resources and depth, more interest, bigger crowds, bigger future interest from kids, parents, sponsors and so on. The English scene is minimalist by comparison, reflected if by no other barometer than by the fact that Toulouse’s Jack Willis is considered the finest in his adopted land, soon to be joined by brother Tom at Bordeaux of all places.

All of this should be aspirational to the English teams. The gap is not that great yet it is there. And this game proved it. When it came to the big moments, UBB had the whip hand. The game may not quite have hit the heights of the PSG-Bayern Champions League semi-final but it was not far off, and it was certainly right up there in the tit-for-tat opening.

Leinster have a rare old chance to re-write these Gallic peans of praise with immediate effect and in terms of stockpiling talent they have the right formula even if their international cast list is not currently delivering the blockbuster performances of which they are capable.

Where do Bath go from here? Or Saints? Or any other sides with ambitions north of the border or across the Irish Sea? Well, Leinster have a rare old chance to re-write these Gallic peans of praise with immediate effect and in terms of stockpiling talent they have the right formula even if their international cast list is not currently delivering the blockbuster performances of which they are capable. When head coach, Leo Cullen, starts to turn on the media as he did in the aftermath of Saturday’s well-deserved but yet incomplete victory over Toulon, you know that the circling of the wagons is the last desperate gambit to get his troops to the exalted level they will need to reach to get past UBB and secure that coveted fifth star.

How long before a PREM club crack the Champions Cup once more? Well, Bath and Saints certainly need a more sustained challenge to their present top dog status. A ten club league with no relegation lacks the depth as well as jeopardy that exists in the Top 14. Bath, to be fair, gave of their all and were thrillingly competitive for a long stetch, marshalled beautifully by Ben Spencer at scrum-half and rounded off with sharp-shooter aplomb by Will Muir.

Bath will be deflated by the result but, in truth, they should be inspired to reach for even greater heights. That would be an outcome really worth pursuing.