Clermont Auvergne are ready to shake things up in this season's Heineken Cup 'pool of death' - starting against 2006 European champions Munster.

Victories in their last two games - Clermont close Pool Five against struggling Llanelli Scarlets next Saturday - could be enough for a quarter-final place.

And it would leave Wasps and Munster, two of the tournament's past winners, potentially facing an early exit.

Clermont have lost both away fixtures, but a third successive home win when Munster arrive at Parc des Sports Marcel-Michelin on Sunday would keep them on track.

"Earlier in the season, there was a lot of talk about Clermont doing their best, but not looking at qualification," said coach Vern Cotter.

"Although this may have been the view from outside the club, we always believed that we deserved to be here and were capable of qualifying for the knockout stages, even in this tough pool.

"It is going to go down to the wire, and we always believed we would be in the mix.

"This is a pretty simple situation. There are three teams - Wasps, Munster and ourselves - who are looking to qualify from this pool, and it is going to come down to the last two matches.

"These are going to be two massive games for all three teams, and nobody is going to give anything away.

"We had a slow start to the season, missing the World Cup players and then only having two matches before the Heineken Cup kicked off, and that threw us off balance, but we have regrouped and are ready for this match.

"This is a very competitive pool, but we are in a reasonably comfortable position and ready to try and finish the job."

Munster, who are again without the services of back injury victim Paul O'Connell, hand All Blacks wing Doug Howlett his Heineken Cup debut in a side skippered by fly-half Ronan O'Gara.

Clermont, meanwhile, parade most of their big names, including centre Marius Joubert, hooker Mario Ledesma and flanker Julien Bonnaire.

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