6 Nations stars to shine in the Heineken Cup

Players such as Vincent Clerc, James Hook, Lee Byrne, Martyn Williams, Shane Williams and Alasdair Strokosch - all winners of man of the match awards in the Six Nations - will be in action on the first weekend of April when the prestigious knock-out stages of European club rugby's premier tournament takes centre stage.

• Five of the top seven scorers - Ronan O'Gara (Munster), James Hook (Ospreys), Chris Paterson (Gloucester Rugby), Shane Williams (Ospreys) and Vincent Clerc (Toulouse) - are with Heineken Cup quarter-finalists.

• Wales wing Shane Williams (Ospreys) equalled the Six Nations try record with six in the tournament, closely followed by France wing Vincent Clerc (Toulouse) with five. Lee Byrne (Ospreys) was in joint third place with three tries.

• Twenty four of the 48 tries scored came from Heineken Cup quarter-finalist players.

• Eight of the 15 Man of the Match awards went to players with Heineken Cup quarter-finalists - Vincent Clerc (Toulouse, 2), Martyn Williams (Cardiff Blues, 2), James Hook, Shane Williams, Lee Byrne (all Ospreys) and Alasdair Strokosch (Gloucester Rugby).

• A total of 56 players from the Heineken Cup quarter-final clubs appeared in the 2008 Six Nations. The Ospreys led the way with 15 followed by Gloucester Rugby (11), Munster (10), Toulouse (8), Cardiff Blues and Perpignan (5 each) and Saracens and London Irish (1 each).

OSPREYS: Lee Byrne, Shane Williams, Sonny Parker, Gavin Henson, James Hook, Mike Phillips, Duncan Jones, Huw Bennett, Adam Jones, Ian Gough, Alun-Wyn Jones, Ian Evans, Jonathan Thomas, Ryan Jones (all Wales), Nikki Walker (Scotland)

GLOUCESTER RUGBY: Iain Balshaw, Mike Tindall, Lesley Vainikolo, Luke Narraway (England), Chris Paterson, Alasdair Strokosch, Rory Lawson, Alasdair Dickinson (Scotland), Carlos Nieto, Marco Bortolami (Italy), Gareth Delve (Wales)
MUNSTER: Ronan O'Gara, Peter Stringer, Marcus Horan, John Hayes, Tony Buckley, Donncha O'Callaghan, Mick O'Driscoll, David Wallace, Denis Leamy, Paul O'Connell (all Ireland)

TOULOUSE: Cedric Heymans, Vincent Clerc, Jean-Baptiste Elissalde, William Servat, Thierry Dusautoir, Jean-Baptiste Poux, Yannick Jauzion (all France), Salvatore Perugini (Italy)

CARDIFF BLUES: Martyn Williams, Jamie Roberts, Tom Shanklin, Gethin Jenkins, Deiniol Jones (all Wales)

PERPIGNAN: Chris Cusiter, Nathan Hines (Scotland), David Marty, Nicolas Mas, Guilhem Guirado (France)

SARACENS: Fabio Ongaro (Italy)

LONDON IRISH: Paul Hodgson (England)