Martin Crowson looks back at five key points from the weekend's rugby action.
1 Do not even bother to start trying to work out the various ramifications of a Leicester Tigers win, or defeat, or draw, or losing bonus point etc, when Toulouse arrive for Sunday's huge Heineken Cup clash at what will be a sold-out Welford Road. As it stands, Leicester could make the quarter-finals or they could be out of the competition. They could have an unlikely home draw, or they could have an away draw. They might qualify for the Amlin Cup, they might not. At this stage, it is as clear as mud.
2 So the quarter-finals of the Heineken Cup will have no Welsh, Scottish or Italian clubs in it. Scottish and Italian sides amassed just three match points between them from 20 combined pool games. And the Ospreys are apparently so short of money that coach Steve Tandy made an impassioned plea for "help" from the Welsh Rugby Union after the game against Leicester for funds to bolster their struggling regions' fortunes. Interesting times.
3 It has been a fantastic month for Tigers in terms of attracting current players to extend their stay at the club. Do not underestimate how hard it is in the current climate to keep world-class players like the Youngs brothers, Steve Mafi, Julian Salvi and their latest re-sign, Geoff Parling. All four of them, along with the likes of Graham Kitchener and Niall Morris, would have attracted big offers in the open market. Their signatures are a public mandate for what Tigers are doing on and off the pitch.
4For the club that gave us Gavin Henson to have a tanning salon just outside the ground and a hairdressers and nail salon inside the ground, is just too good to be true, right? Wrong. Welcome to the Ospreys' Liberty Stadium. You could not make it up.
5 Far from me to accuse travelling French sides of being traditionally flaky in cold weather but, with the temperatures in Leicester not supposed to get much above freezing point all week and some more snow likely towards the weekend, let's just say that Toulouse's mental strength could be tested to the full.
