John Barclay insists Glasgow have a genuine chance to emulate Northampton’s feat of reaching last season’s Investec Champions Cup final – and inspire Scotland heading into the Six Nations Championship.

Franco Smith’s Warriors are 80 minutes from topping Pool 1 with the real possibility of advancing as a top-two seed into the knockout stages, which would guarantee home advantage through to the Bilbao showpiece on May 23.

No Scottish side has reached the final of European rugby’s blue riband tournament; Edinburgh’s semi-final loss to Ulster in 2012 the closest a tartan team has come.

But the manner in which Glasgow won at Sale and dispatched French giants Toulouse and Clermont in their Champions Cup outings has seen their odds slashed to 14/1 fifth favourites.

Holders favourites, but don’t count out the Scots

Holders Bordeaux lead the market, which few would argue with, followed by Leinster, Toulouse and Bath. But Glasgow, on their artificial surface, are a tough nut to crack. They last lost there in 2023. Beat Saracens at home on Sunday and opportunity knocks.

“This Glasgow side has the potential to go deep into the competition,” says Barclay, the former Scotland captain. “If they can get on the right side of the draw, I like their chances.

“Look at Northampton last season. They bagged a home draw by winning their pool, then got hot for a couple of weeks at home and were into the semi-finals.

“No one was talking about Northampton when the tournament started. They were by the end. Their belief grew round by round to the point they beat Leinster in the Dublin semi-final.

“If Glasgow can get past Saracens on Sunday, they just need to get hot, as Saints did. This is a Glasgow team capable of getting very hot. They have that level in them.”

Barclay, a pundit for broadcaster Premier Sports, stresses that he is not getting ahead of himself.

Nobody need tell him how lopsided the ledger is between Glasgow and Saracens in the Londoners’ favour. Glasgow’s two Champions Cup quarter-finals have resulted in defeat to Mark McCall’s side.

But he says: “I’m a big fan of what Glasgow are doing, the way they’re trying to play the game. I love almost everything about going to Scotstoun and watching them play.

“I really admire what Franco Smith has done there. It’s not an easy job, and it’s certainly no easier when you get told your budget for foreign players is getting cut.

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“Glasgow are absolutely not in the same conversation as Bordeaux, Toulouse, Leinster – those teams with time-and-again proven pedigree and success in this competition.

“They just crack on and get their heads down. They show up time and time again and deliver.”

Glasgow’s last chance

This may well be Glasgow’s best chance to achieve something historic. This summer, they say goodbye to Lions centre Huw Jones and Scotland fly-half Adam Hastings, bound for Toulon and Montpellier respectively.

They are likely also fuelled by the flak fired at Scotland after an autumn in which the national side, with six Glasgow starters, blew a 21-0 lead after half time to lose to Argentina, conceding four tries in the last 18 minutes at Murrayfield.

How big a factor we are talking about here is hard to quantify; to what degree players involved in that capitulation returned to Scotstoun with a ‘sod you’ mentality towards the critics and a resolve to prove a point.

“There’s definitely a sense of ‘up yours’,” Barclay says. “That chip-on-your-shoulder, level of desperation and bloody-mindedness to prove people wrong.

“That is quite a powerful thing. You don’t want to rely on it, certainly, but that’s the sense I get. And I quite like it.”

Scotland’s Six Nations campaign begins in Rome, three weeks this Saturday, and Barclay is clear that having a team – or teams, as Edinburgh are still in contention to reach the Round of 16 – competing at the business end of the Champions Cup, would lift the entire rugby nation.

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He says: “Scotland go to Italy, then come home to the Calcutta Cup, which has been a pretty happy hunting ground for a number of years, and then Wales away. You look at that and think, ‘that could be a great start to the tournament’.

“The flip side is they lose in Italy, then face an England team more than likely on a 12-game winning streak! I’ve been around long enough to know it’s bloody hard to be successful in international rugby.

“They’ll know there’ll be a load of people waiting in the wings ready to throw a custard pie their way if they do underperform.

“But I think that’s probably something that’s galvanising this group. There seems to be a bristliness, a real spiky, pissed-off edge to the players.

“It’s very easy to have that the week after a disappointing autumn series. The challenge for the group is, how do we take that disappointment and make sure, when we go to Rome on the first week and then back to Murrayfield to play England, that chip-on-the-shoulder, level of frustration, is still working for us.”

John Barclay is part of the Premier Sports team bringing a packed weekend of international rugby action as the knock stages are decided with 15 blockbuster fixtures live on Premier Sports. Friday night kicks off with Bath v Edinburgh (Premier Sports One 7pm) with the finale of the pool stages Glasgow Warriors v Saracens (Premier Sports 2 at 5.15pm). Visit www.premiersports.com to join in from just £11.99 a month.

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