Toulouse, three times winners, roused themselves just enough on their own patch yesterday to score 25 second-half points, including three tries, to put Cardiff out of Europe. But if the scoreline was to be expected, the manner of its making was not. On another day Toulouse might have been embarrassed by their own mistakes.
For 60 minutes they were error-ridden but, when a team has the cutting edge of Cedric Heymans, Vincent Clerc and the Fijian Maleli Kunavore, no side should feel comfortable and in Midi-Pyrenees yesterday it was Cardiff who suffered. Seemingly in the blink of an eye the Blues went from at the races to on the ropes. "If we want to be a better team, we'll learn from that. Lessons don't come any better," said their head coach, Dai Young.
First Kunavore scored the try of the game on the right, tip-toeing down the touchline to finish off a move created by Jean-Baptiste Elissalde and Yannick Jauzion and then Clerc zeroed in on the left, the last man in a four-on-one overlap. Ben Blair got one back for Cardiff but by then the game was lost. All that remained was for the replacement, Jean Bouilhou, to kill it off and Heymans to rub salt in Cardiff wounds with a drop-goal from 40 metres on the whistle.
London Irish at Twickenham in three weeks will be Toulouse's seventh semi-final but getting there was a roller-coaster ride for the most successful side in Europe. They will find it hard to sell 80,000 tickets on the back of their first-half performance.
The Cardiff challenge could not have got off to a worse start. Late arrivals were still shuffling into the Stade Municipal when Ellisalde's poor clearance from the kick-off was replied to in kind - Tom Shanklin's half-hearted chip bouncing off the shins of Kunavore. The Fijian centre simply stooped to collect the ball before chipping it 30 metres into the Cardiff in-goal area. Maxime Medard won the race with something to spare and only 44 seconds on the clock.
When Ellisalde banged over a 40-metre penalty - to go with his conversion - Toulouse were 10 points ahead with only four minutes gone. It looked like big trouble for Cardiff but Shanklin, along with the Toulouse old boy Gareth Thomas, made amends winning a penalty. Blair pulled it but after 15 minutes of Cardiff pressure Jason Spice's try got them going.
Shanklin started the move with Tom James and was on hand to receive the return pass five metres out. Shanklin almost made it himself but at least created a big enough hole for the scrum-half to dart through. Blair got the kick but then conspired with Spice to make a mess of clearing their lines to give Elissalde an easy three points. The lead was barely deserved on few flashes of inspiration.
What pressure there was was coming from the Blues and, but for Shanklin tripping over Nicky Walker's legs, they should have scored from one of Toulouse's more exotic howlers - Heymans taking a quick throw-in and somehow finding the Cardiff wing under the Toulouse posts.
So, just two kicks down at the interval, one of them a 40-metre drop-goal by Elissalde, Cardiff would have been entitled to think they were in with a shout. Toulouse were finding it hard to string passes together, their defence was erratic and Elissalde seemed out of place at No10.
How wrong. The vultures were beginning to gather.
"If anybody doubted whether they were a force in Europe any longer that was the performance to watch," said Young. "They have great balance in their forward play and the backs and in the last 20 minutes they just stepped it up a bit. They were pretty clinical and when they had the opportunity they took it. We hammered away for 60 minutes but in the end you couldn't argue with that. And who is going to bet against them winning [the cup] now?"
Toulouse Heymans; Clerc, Kunavore (Ahotaeiloa 72), Jauzion, Medard; Elissalde (Courrent 73), Kelleher; Human, Servat (Vernet Basualdo 66), Perugini (Poux ht), Pelous (capt, Millo-Chluski 67), Albacete, Nyanga (Bouilhou 57), Dusautoir, Sowerby.
Tries Medard, Kunavore, Clerc, Bouilhou. Con Elissalde 3. Pens Ellisalde 3. Drop goal Elissalde, Heymans.
Sin-bin Heymans 27.
Cardiff Blues Blair; Roberts, Shanklin (J Robinson 65), Thomas, James; Flannagan (N Robinson 59), Spice; Jenkins (Yallop ht), G Williams, Filise, Jones, Tito (White 52), Molitika, M Williams, Rush (capt).
Tries Spice, Blair. Con Blair 2. Pen Blair.
Sin-bin Spice 31.
Referee W Barnes (Eng).
Attendance 35,070.
