Clermont Auvergne lock Jamie Cudmore admitted that a desire for revenge fuelled his side's 13-9 European Champions Cup semi-final victory over Saracens.

The French club were trounced 46-6 by the same opponents at the same stage of last year's competition, but edged a pulsating clash in Saint Etienne on Saturday courtesy of a try from Wesley Fofana and eight points from the boot of Brock James.

"We had been looking forward to this game all week because of what happened in the semi-final last year," said Cudmore.

"We were looking for a rematch and now the dream of winning the European Cup lives on."

Clermont began brightly, just as they did against Northampton in the quarter-finals, but they found Saracens a much harder nut to crack and actually trailed 6-3 at the break.

Fofana's try three minutes into the second half changed the complexion of the game, however, and Franck Azema's men duly finished the job to set up a mouth-watering final against either Leinster or Toulon on May 2nd.

"They (Saracens) came with exactly what we thought they would come with, but we just stuck to our guns and tried to hang onto the ball a little bit longer,” said Cudmore, who was making his 50th European appearance for the club.

"Nothing gets given to you in rugby and now we have got to go to Twickenham and grasp the occasion with both hands."

Saracens, meanwhile, were able to take plenty of positives from a gutsy performance in which they more than matched their star-studded opponents in almost every department.

Full-back Alex Goode said: "We stopped them from playing and it was a great chance for us.

"But the character of the squad shone through.

"We gave 100 per cent and this won't detract from our season.

"We defended very well and were pleased with our first half. 

"They stopped playing a bit in the second half and we should have capitalised a bit more on that, but we could not get on the front foot and move them around more."