THE Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir, more commonly known as the Stade de Colombes, was the venue of Eric Liddell’s 400-metres triumph at the 1924 Olympics. To followers of Scottish rugby, it is also known as the site of a famous victory by the national team in the 1969 Five Nations Championship.

More fancifully, but also perhaps more relevantly to today’s game between Racing 92 and Glasgow Warriors, it was the supposed venue for the football match in the film Escape To Victory. If Gregor Townsend’s team win this afternoon’s Champions Cup match against the pool leaders, the achievement may just come to be seen as only marginally less incredible than the climax of that Nazis-v-Allies cult classic.

The Warriors were always going to be up against it in this one. Racing, with new recruit Dan Carter having apparently slotted in seamlessly, are in seriously good form. Glasgow, on the other hand, have struggled for consistency in the PRO12, never mind in the tougher environment of continental competition.

Throw a lengthening injury list into the mix and it becomes clear that if the visitors are to win this afternoon, they will have to play out of their skins. In some cases, indeed, that will mean playing at a higher level than they have previously been thought capable.

Townsend’s declaration on Thursday that his team would go out to attack Racing appears by far the best strategy for coming out of the match with anything. Glasgow are not the kind of side who feel comfortable with a containing game in any case, and attempting such a tactic against opponents of Racing’s calibre would surely at best do no more than limit the scale of defeat.

Indeed, the fact that the odds are stacked against them may actually help them prepare for an almighty effort. It is when you are expected to win comfortably that caution can begin to creep into your play. A presumption that you will lose heavily can have a liberating effect on your performance.

Certainly, Pat MacArthur, preferred at hooker to Fraser Brown, sees no reason to feel trepidatious about this encounter with the Pool 3 leaders. “That's why we play - to confront these big guys,” said MacArthur, who signed a new contract with the Warriors this week. “To play a French team in France - I've played against a few and it's been amazing.

“It's a great experience getting stuck in there. We've analysed them a lot and been training very hard on what we want to do and now it’s about going out there and putting that together.

“You have to go in there with a confidence about you and take it to them. These are not games where you can feel your way in, because they’re a team full of superstars and they’ll be wanting to do something. You have to just go for it from minute one and that’s what the experience of doing it before will teach you.”

Although the form that took Glasgow to last season’s PRO12 title has been elusive this time round, MacArthur has been with the club long enough to put the current, temporary dip in form into perspective. What is more, he is confident that an upturn in the team’s fortunes is not far away.

“Oh no, not at all,” he said. “When you analyse things, you can be one pass away from the game here or a slight tweak. Analysing that, hopefully we can move forward.

“We set out our goal at the start of the season that this is a big step for us in Europe and we wanted to be making the knockout stages. We have put in huge amounts of work over Christmas.

“Unfortunately the results over the Christmas games have not gone our way, but that’s going to spur us on even more to show where we are and how good we can be. Going to France is a massive challenge, but one that we are looking forward to.

“As a Glasgow boy I love it here. I've done my whole career here, right from the start. The first year I was here we came 11th [in the PRO12]! I've been here for seven seasons now, this is my eighth, and it’s just been a joy.”

With the best will in the world, it is hard to see how MacArthur and his team-mates will be able to use the same word at the end of this match. Had the game been in November’s first round of fixtures as originally scheduled, the Warriors might just have caught Racing cold. But the Paris attacks of that month forced a postponement, and in the intervening eight weeks the home team have grown steadily more formidable.

Glasgow’s hopes of qualifying for the quarter-finals will not evaporate entirely if they lose today, and they may even find a degree of solace in a losing bonus point. What they must avoid at all costs, however, is the sort of seriously heavy defeat that would leave them not only dejected on the journey home, but also out of sorts for the even more vital pool games to follow.

Racing 92 (v Glasgow Warriors at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir, today, 1pm British time): J Goosen; J Imhoff, H Chavancy, A Dumoulin, M Andreu; D Carter, M Machenaud; E Ben Arous, D Szarzewski, B Tameifuna, L Charteris, M Carizza, Y Nyanga, W Lauret, C Masoe. Substitutes: C Chat, J Brugnaut, L Ducalcon, B Le Roux, A Claassen, B Doulin, M Phillips, C Laulala.

Glasgow Warriors: S Hogg; T Naiyaravoro, M Bennett, F Russell, S Lamont; D Weir, A Price; G Reid, P MacArthur, Z Fagerson, L Nakarawa, J Gray, R Wilson, C Fusaro, A Ashe. Substitutes: F Brown, A Allan, S Puafisi, G Peterson, H Blake, L Jones, S Johnson, G Bryce.