Samsung’s legal team sure has its hands full right now. The Korean company’s attorneys are currently in a northern California court battling Apple’s patent infringement claims in a trial that could cost them billions of dollars.

But apparently Samsung isn’t going at it alone. A new report is out this morning claiming that Google has been quietly lending support to the consumer electronics giant, offering legal help and use of its large pool of resources…

CNET reports :

“Rather, Google has been quietly lending support, coordinating with Samsung over legal strategies, providing advice, doing extra legwork, and searching for prior evidence, CNET has learned from people familiar with the situation.”

Interestingly enough, Google’s support doesn’t stop with Samsung. The site points out that one of Samsung’s lead lawyers, Charles Verhoeven of Quinn Emanuel, is also representing HTC and Motorola in patent litigation against Apple.

In fact, the report goes on to say that it’s possible that Google has an indemnity agreement with Verhoven that covers all of its Android partners. And if that’s the case, then the search giant might actually be footing some of Samsung’s litigation bill.

Of course, Google’s involvement isn’t the least bit surprising. Even though Apple’s claims in this particular case aren’t, for the most part, directed at Android, Google does have a lot riding on the outcome of this trial. If Apple wins, Google could see a number of its best-selling Android smartphones and tablets banned from the US.

But perhaps the most interesting aspect of all of this is that it seems we are getting closer and closer to the real battle everyone wants to see, which is Apple vs. Google. Since it debuted in 2009, Apple has seen Google’s mobile OS as a blatant ripoff of iOS, and has accordingly filed lawsuits against all three of Android’s top partners.