Rugby French Championship:  As the Top-14 season kicks off, Gerry Thornley looks at its growing relevance in Ireland

We are indebted to the Heineken European Cup for many things, not the least of which is that it extended our experiences of French rugby beyond biennial visits to Paris. The Cup has opened our eyes and ears to all the passion and hostility and friendliness that make the south the hotbed of the French game.

When the Top 14 kicks off this weekend a line could be drawn above the bottom third of France to embrace all bar the cosmopolitan nouveaux riches of Stade Français from the capital.

For us, interest in the destiny of the Bouclier de Brennus has been heightened in recent times by the growing trail of Irish players to France as well as the weekly coverage on Setanta TV.

The country is already in a fair old tizzy over hosting the 2007 World Cup (which kicks off on September 7th when Les Bleus play Argentina and concludes in the Stade de France with the final on October 20th).

As France are in Ireland's group, the curiosity factor here will be greater than ever.

Interestingly, to cope with what many see as an extended campaign to incorporate the Coupe du Monde, the French championship is closing down for the duration of the Six Nations, from the end of January until the last weekend in March.

Effectively then, the frontline players will have two rest weeks during the Six Nations, à la their Celtic counterparts, while the rest will have a two-week mid-season break, two weeks of conditioning and three weeks of training interspersed with a couple of friendlies. But they will all still have to resume the Top 14 a week after the Six Nations.

In effect, this means deux saisons en une, with 19 rounds until January 23rd, and the final seven rounds worked in from March 23rd until May 27th, culminating in the semi-finals and final (June 9th).

Aside from starting ahead of their main European rivals, two midweek rounds are being squeezed into Wednesday August, 30th, and Tuesday, September 26th.

A leading French player could, conceivably, play 45 competitive matches the season just before hosting the World Cup.

Amid such a tug of war, an accord has been agreed with a view to squad rotation and player management, albeit unspecified.

Bernard Laporte has increasingly concentrated Les Bleus around the leading three or four sides, and given the additional demands of the European Cup, you'd imagine this should open the way for less celebrated squads. Au contraire. An elite has formed within the Top 14 - witness six of the same seven sides qualifying for the European Cup - and an elite within an elite, given Biarritz Olympique (three), Stade Toulousain (six) and Stade Français (four) have won the last 13 boucliers dating back to the triumph of Castres in 1993.

The 26-game campaign seems like a procession, with the aforementioned trio joined by Perpignan last season in the play-offs as that quartet lost just three games out of 52 at home.

The appeal of rugby in the south is attributed to it succeeding the centuries-old sport of La Soule, a legitimised tribal battle between towns, and thus it inherited l'esprit de clocher (the spirit of the bell tower). Last season the ratio of home wins exceeded 75 per cent.

Biarritz's 40-13 victory over Toulouse in last season's final underlined Munster's achievement in overcoming Patrice Lagisquet's team in the European Cup final. Conquering Europe is next on the BO agenda, yet a third successive bouclier would see them emulate only Stade Français (1893-95), Stade Bordelais (1904-07), Toulouse (1922-24), Lourdes (1956-58) and Toulouse again (1994-97) in winning three or more times in succession.

A straw poll of the Top 14 coaches, no less than journalists and public, made them favourites to lift the trophy again when they kicked off this season's campaign at home to Clermont Auvergne last night. They unveiled their new stand against Sale last week, increasing their capacity to what may be a rarely filled 13,500, but the 38-20 defeat highlighted the difficulties in assimilating the highly rated backrower Mohammed Dridi into their complicated and normally parsimonious defence after the loss of the excellent Thierry Dusautoir to Toulouse.

Biarritz's frontliners proved remarkably durable on two fronts last season but in truth Stade Français especially, and in all the key positions, along with Toulouse, have more strength in depth. The progressive Fabien Galthie-coached Parisians will again host both their main domestic rivals, as well as Sale in the European Cup, at the 80,000 Stade de France.

Toulouse have been victims of their own success in reaching 13 successive semi-finals, and much has been made of their failure to win the bouclier since the last of their record 16 titles in 2001. Typically, Ulster's European Cup opponents have strengthened modestly if adroitly, with the arrival of Italian prop Salvatore Perugini and Puma lock Patricio Albacete as well as Dusautoir and scrumhalf Valentin Courrent from Sale, but there should still be plenty of game time for Trevor Brennan, sidelined initially for a few weeks with a cracked vertebra.

The Barnhall Bruiser, contracted until the end of the World Cup after turning down overtures from Leinster, is entering his fifth season with the Rouge et Noir, a remarkable testament to his durability at the top end of this league, which is unlikely to be equalled by any Irish player.

This season the ex-Munster trio of Mike Prendergast, Paul Devlin and Rob Henderson have pitched up in France.

Prendergast is at Bourgoin, Munster's European Cup pool rivals who, like Leinster's group opponents Agen, are an unknown quantity after a summer turnover in personnel. The latter are also without Rupeni Caucaunibuca (33 tries in the last two Top 14 campaigns), who is back in Fiji, unwell after losing 10 kilos with a virus and out indefinitely.

Devlin is at newly promoted Albi (favourites for one of two relegation slots) while Henderson is at relegated but big-spending Toulon, under pressure for an automatic return after a summer spending spree that will see Tana Umaga pitch up for eight games during the New Zealand off-season for an estimated €350,000.