No handicap has ever been too great a burden for Saracens

Mark McCall’s public confession that Saracens may have to sacrifice the Champions’ Cup in order to preserve their domestic status will have fallen on stony ground all over Europe.

The image of the durable English heavyweights surrendering their title without throwing a punch, the way Sonny Liston did against the then Cassius Clay more than half a century ago, is too implausible to envisage.