The New European Cup Thread Part 2- Competition Format

[Scrumpy]

I know there is already a thread running but it lacks the details and anyway it has nearly run its course (a bit like the HC!   )

European Rugby Champions Cup
 
The new structure of European rugby is here at last. Here is the breakdown of exactly what is replacing the Heineken Cup.
 
 
The European Rugby Champions Cup
 
Twenty clubs qualifying through the finishing positions in their leagues from the preceding season:
 
Top six from Top 14
Top six from Aviva Premiership
Top seven from PRO 12, with at least one club from each country participating in the league.
 
For the 2014-15 campaign, the 20th place will be taken by the winner of a play-off between the seventh highest finishing club in the Top 14 and in the Premiership. The play-off will be played in May 2014, either as one match (in which case, there will be a draw for home advantage) or as home/away.
 
For subsequent seasons: The seventh highest finishing club from Top 14, the seventh highest finishing club from the Premiership and the eighth and ninth highest finishing clubs from PRO 12 will play-off.
 
From 2015 season, if the previous season's European Rugby Challenge Cup winner has not already qualified through its finishing position in its league, it will participate in the play-off by taking a place given to its league.
 
 
 
European Rugby Challenge Cup
 
It will consist of 20 clubs comprising 18 clubs from Top 14, Premiership Rugby and PRO 12. The other two spots will go to two clubs from the qualifying competition organised with FIRA-AER (Fédération Internationale de Rugby Amateur - Association Européenne de Rugby).
 
 
The format of both competitions
 
The competitions will take place over nine weekends. The Pool phase will be through five Pools of four teams which will play each other home and away. The five Pool winners and the 3 best runners-up will qualify for the quarter-finals. The last eight will be played at the home venues of the four best Pool winners.
 
The Pool phase will be played in three blocks of two weekends and will be completed by the end of January. The final will take place latest the first weekend of May.
 
 
The governing body
 
The competition will be run by a board of directors and an executive committee in charge of commercial matters all under the auspices of European Professional Club Rugby, the body replacing European Rugby Cup Ltd. The EPCR Board shall have an independent Chairman and will be chaired in Switzerland.
 
There will be an equal distribution of funds with the nine constituent parties agreeing to the above format. They are: Federation Francaise de Rugby (FFR), Federazione Italiana Rugby (FIR), Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU), Ligue Nationale De Rugby (LNR), Premiership Rugby Ltd (PRL), Regional Rugby Wales Ltd (RRW), Rugby Football Union
 
 
 
IRB chairman Bernard Lapasset added: "European rugby fans and the top players can now look forward to a strong accord and competition structure that promotes and celebrates the best of the European game."
 
Can't wait, but I hope they get a sponsor as the names are too similar imo. 

[Guest]

Just to bump it for you, Scrumpy   

[Scrumpy]

Thanks fella I have to say I'm loving this new format, just what the doctor ordered.

[LeinsterFan4life]

I wonder how that qualification for the Amlin is going to work... Will the pro Russian teams finally get a chance to qualify for the second tier?

[Scrumpy]

There is a 3rd tier Qualifying Competition, so I guess these teams will have a chance to get into the Challenge up, not much info on that at present.

[Guest]

I have to admit that I'm disappointed that the HEC is being replaced, but that doesn't mean I can't look forward to this new competition, and hope that it is at least successful as that which it replaces.
I have my doubts about the future of European rugby, but that's more to do with the political side of things, and concerns as to where the game is going, than it is do with the new format.
The format isn't drastically different than what we have now, although the split in broadcasting is a concern as it may mean fans either missing out on some games, or paying much more to get both Sky and BT coverage.
Another concern is these play offs all being away games for Rabo sides. It just doesn't make sense. I can't think why the brains trust couldn't have come up with a better solution, but hopefully that is something that can be rectified in the future. Just to clarify; I don't hold one side alone responsible for this, but both sides of those in negotiations.

[Scrumpy]

I blame ERC, they abused their power by not listening or meeting the English and French clubs. Once they did that the HC and Amlin was dead in the water but its all history now, lets look forward to a exciting new fair for all Euro Cup.   

[Guest]

I was referring to play off away games. Not the fact that the HEC is being replaced. I'm sure we all have our own ideas as to who is to blame for that, as we also will likely do on what can be considered fair...

But yes, let's all look forward to this new Euro Cup   

[Kingshu]

Anyone know how the pools will now be seeded?

Will they still use the European Rugby Club Rankings?

[Exiledinborders]

I have to admit that I'm disappointed that the HEC is being replaced, but that doesn't mean I can't look forward to this new competition, and hope that it is at least successful as that which it replaces.
I have my doubts about the future of European rugby, but that's more to do with the political side of things, and concerns as to where the game is going, than it is do with the new format.
The format isn't drastically different than what we have now, although the split in broadcasting is a concern as it may mean fans either missing out on some games, or paying much more to get both Sky and BT coverage.
Another concern is these play offs all being away games for Rabo sides. It just doesn't make sense. I can't think why the brains trust couldn't have come up with a better solution, but hopefully that is something that can be rectified in the future. Just to clarify; I don't hold one side alone responsible for this, but both sides of those in negotiations.

To be fair seven Rabo sides get automatic qualification. The seventh placed AP and Top14 sides just get a play off place. Giving them home advantage over Rabo 8th and 9th teams seems fair. You could make an argument for just having an AP/top14 play-off. I am happy with the compromise.

[LeinsterFan4life]

The Rabo has to get more spots because the league is made up of 4 different nations.

[Guest]

Nice that you're happy with an unfair advantage given to English and French sides. So much for all the chat from some guys here on qualifying on merit, eh?....

I don't think it makes sense, and I do think it will be a bone of contention while it is in place. When it comes to compromise they could have agreed one less Rabo side in the play offs, or none at all. Give an extra place to a second tier team maybe. Anything, but this nonsense.

[Exiledinborders]

I blame ERC, they abused their power by not listening or meeting the English and French clubs. Once they did that the HC and Amlin was dead in the water but its all history now, lets look forward to a exciting new fair for all Euro Cup.   

I agree. Let us hope that in future when one party is unhappy people get round the table and talk rather than refusing to discuss anything until the unhappy party gives notice and starts organising an alternative.

[Exiledinborders]

Nice that you're happy with an unfair advantage given to English and French sides. So much for all the chat from some guys here on qualifying on merit, eh?....

I don't think it makes sense, and I do think it will be a bone of contention while it is in place. When it comes to compromise they could have agreed one less Rabo side in the play offs, or none at all. Give an extra place to a second tier team maybe. Anything, but this nonsense.

I am sure the eighth and ninth Rabo teams would prefer an away play-off to no qualification at all.  Given that there is no relegation in Rabo it will mean more teams have something to fight for at the end of the season.

[Scrumpy]

Its a win win.

[Guest]

Nice that you're happy with an unfair advantage given to English and French sides. So much for all the chat from some guys here on qualifying on merit, eh?....

I don't think it makes sense, and I do think it will be a bone of contention while it is in place. When it comes to compromise they could have agreed one less Rabo side in the play offs, or none at all. Give an extra place to a second tier team maybe. Anything, but this nonsense.

I am sure the eighth and ninth Rabo teams would prefer an away play-off to no qualification at all.  Given that there is no relegation in Rabo it will mean more teams have something to fight for at the end of the season.

I'm certain they would have preferred a level playing field, and not one tilted in favour of French and English sides. Are AP or T14 7th placed team afraid of the competition an 8th or 9th placed Rabo side can provide?

Like I said, for all the previous chat on merit, it seems strange that any can be happy with teams being quaranteed an unfair advantage. But then, maybe not so strange...

[HammerofThunor]

You are right. It would have been fairer and more meritocratic for the 7th places in French and English leagues to play off against each other.

[Exiledinborders]

Nice that you're happy with an unfair advantage given to English and French sides. So much for all the chat from some guys here on qualifying on merit, eh?....

I don't think it makes sense, and I do think it will be a bone of contention while it is in place. When it comes to compromise they could have agreed one less Rabo side in the play offs, or none at all. Give an extra place to a second tier team maybe. Anything, but this nonsense.

I am sure the eighth and ninth Rabo teams would prefer an away play-off to no qualification at all.  Given that there is no relegation in Rabo it will mean more teams have something to fight for at the end of the season.

I'm certain they would have preferred a level playing field, and not one tilted in favour of French and English sides. Are AP or PRL 7th placed team afraid of the competition an 8th or 9th placed Rabo side can provide?

Like I said, for all the previous chat on merit, it seems strange that any can be happy with teams being quaranteed an unfair advantage. But then, maybe not so strange...

Seven Rabo teams qualify automatically. The seventh AP and Top14 teams get a play-off place. Who is getting an unfair advantage?

[Guest]

You are right. It would have been fairer and more meritocratic for the 7th places in French and English leagues to play off against each other.

You're missing your target with that one, Hammer. Check my previous comments....

[Exiledinborders]

You are right. It would have been fairer and more meritocratic for the 7th places in French and English leagues to play off against each other.

That is right but I assume the Rabo Unions would not accept that. This is a compromise. A messy one but worth it to have a competition with all involved.

[Guest]

You are right. It would have been fairer and more meritocratic for the 7th places in French and English leagues to play off against each other.

That is right but I assume the Rabo Unions would not accept that. This is a compromise. A messy one but worth it to have a competition with all involved.

It isn't worth it if it's going to be a bone of contention throughout the competition. You're right though. It is messy.

[quinsforever]

Anyone know how the pools will now be seeded?

Will they still use the European Rugby Club Rankings?

They won't use ERC rankings. There is widespread agreement about the flaws in the ERC ranking points given different challenges of qualifying in different leagues. don't know what they are going to replace it with.

To be fair, this should be one of the first jobs of the commercial committee. A test of the commercial acumen of the clubmen. The aim should be to maximise the interest level, support, TV viewing and excitement of the pool matches, so they need to design a set of rules to do just that. Seeding is important probably for the top few sides. They also need some rules to prevent, lets say, the two weakest teams from each league playing in the same pool, or too many teams from each country playing in each pool. Notch had some great suggestions about how to do this on the other thread.

[Exiledinborders]

The simplest way would be not to have seeding just use league places an allocate pool places accordingly.

So in Year 1 it might be AP-T14-P12 order meaning:
Pool 1     Pool 2     Pool 3    Pool 4    Pool 5
AP 1.      T14 1.     P12 1.    AP 2.    T14 2
P12 2.     AP 3.      T14  3.   P12 3.   AP.  4
T14 4.     P12 4.    AP.  5.    T14 5.   P12  5
AP  6.      T14. 6.   P12 6.    P12 7.   Play off

In Year 2 P12-AP-T14. In year 3 T14-P12-AP

This makes league places worth fighting for even once qualification is assured.

[broadlandboy]

Exiled, you are seeding by league position. In your example you could have the 3 champions in pools 2 or 4

[Feckless Rogue]

I have to agree that the rabo nations brought all this on themselves by refusing to address Franglo club concerns. I don't know about the French, but the English had been disgruntled for many years. The rabo's seemed to think it would be unthinkable for the Franglo's to pull out of such a brilliant competition. They should have been more proactive much earlier.

In the end, though we have an almost identical competition with almost the same governance, with a bit more say for the club owners. And a more equal distribution of TV money across teams, which is the one Franglo demand I had no problem with. I'm a bit annoyed the number of teams has been cut. And removing qualification for the 2nd tier winner and replacing that with these playoffs is a dumb move. But there's been quite a bit of stupidity on show from the people involved in all this for a long time so we shouldn't be surprised.

I've a question. When UEFA lauched the Champions league, it was clearly a new competition. But they kind of kept old European Cup records from history. Teams like Madrid, Liverpool etc. count former European Cup wins from long ago and more recent Champions league wins as the same thing. So Madrid's website would say they are 9 times European Champions, which covers both competitions.

I was just wondering will Leinster still be able to swan around with three stars on their jersey and be recognized as triple European champs, or did the PRL want the former competition erased from history?

Not a very important question in the grand scheme of things but I'm just curious.

[HammerofThunor]

No, it's all scrapped. A key part of the new deal was to erase the Irish previous successes from record.

The stars thing isn't really 'official' is it? It's just something teams do, I thought.

[Engine#4]

Maybe the PRL will allow it as Leinster didn't have an Italian team in their group for any of their wins   

[Feckless Rogue]

The stars thing isn't really 'official' is it? It's just something teams do, I thought.

Ha, you're probably absolutely correct. Sure maybe we'll go with four next year. One for that time we were robbed by the ref in the pools stage which stopped our march to the title.

[HammerofThunor]

The stars thing isn't really 'official' is it? It's just something teams do, I thought.

Ha, you're probably absolutely correct. Sure maybe we'll go with four next year. One for that time we were robbed by the ref in the pools stage which stopped our march to the title.

When was that?   

[quinsforever]

Good posts feckless

Does seem like a dogs dinner of playoff compromises. Is certainly down to the challenge of keeping four unions within a single league happy. Very tough ask.

But I massively agree with u that had the rabo unions ignored ERC and engaged with the franglos earlier, they would have gotten a better deal. 8/6/6 was initially proposed by prl for example...

[stub]

I have to agree that the rabo nations brought all this on themselves by refusing to address Franglo club concerns. I don't know about the French, but the English had been disgruntled for many years. The rabo's seemed to think it would be unthinkable for the Franglo's to pull out of such a brilliant competition. They should have been more proactive much earlier.

In the end, though we have an almost identical competition with almost the same governance, with a bit more say for the club owners. And a more equal distribution of TV money across teams, which is the one Franglo demand I had no problem with. I'm a bit annoyed the number of teams has been cut. And removing qualification for the 2nd tier winner and replacing that with these playoffs is a dumb move. But there's been quite a bit of stupidity on show from the people involved in all this for a long time so we shouldn't be surprised.

I've a question. When UEFA lauched the Champions league, it was clearly a new competition. But they kind of kept old European Cup records from history. Teams like Madrid, Liverpool etc. count former European Cup wins from long ago and more recent Champions league wins as the same thing. So Madrid's website would say they are 9 times European Champions, which covers both competitions.

I was just wondering will Leinster still be able to swan around with three stars on their jersey and be recognized as triple European champs, or did the PRL want the former competition erased from history?

Not a very important question in the grand scheme of things but I'm just curious.

Agree with Hammer, PRL want stars all gone and Irish team only allowed in every other year - games to be played at HQ.

[LeinsterFan4life]

How do you know 8/6/6 was on the table?

[Exiledinborders]

Exiled, you are seeding by league position. In your example you could have the 3 champions in pools 2 or 4

Probably should have clarified. The order would be:
1 Champions
2 Losing finalist
3 Losing semi finalist with highest league finishing position
4 other losing semi finalist

[Dave.]

I'm interested in this Qualifying Competition. Two Italian sides we know, but who will be the rest? Wolves and Luistanos probably and then say other representative sides from Georgia, Russia and other top 2nd tier nations?

[quinsforever]

LF4L, 8/6/6 was widely reported as the initial PRL proposal back in June July 2012

[HammerofThunor]

That was 8/8/8 wasn't it?

[LeinsterFan4life]

That is what journalists are reporting. Who knows what was actually on the table or if they were even negotiating back then?

[The Saint]

Notch, what other term would you use to describe them? I know most only want what is best for European rugby. But then there's the other rabble...

BTW, how are the profits to be divided up between the 3 League's, do you know?

[Notch]

There a lot of terms I'd use for some of the people in boardrooms across England and France, to be honest, and I understand why fans feel the need to vent their frustration. I have done it myself and I hold my hand up. I've been as much at fault as anybody in that respect because of the massive frustration this whole deadlock has caused.

I'm just saying that if the other million threads we've had on the topic are anything to go by, doing that just ends up degenerating into boobie for tat.

[Notch]

Anyway, I think that the IRFU and WRU are getting twice as much as the Italians and Scots on the basis they provide more teams. I'm slightly disappointed by that- I feel that if we split the money equally between the four unions that make up the Pro12 it would allow the Italians and Scots to invest more in their sides and make the Pro12 stronger.

Of course, the Welsh regions are resolutely opposed to that because they get less funding from their union than the Irish, Scots and Italians get. So I think that the split is being done per team as opposed to a four-way split. That was the hold-up wasn't it? The Italians were contesting that point.

[broadlandboy]

IIRC the minimum is €5.1 for IRE/WAL/SCO & €4.7 for Italy, hence Italians unwilling to sign. They thought that that all Unions get the same or Wal/Ire get €5.1 & Sco/Ita get €4.9

[Notch]

Yes, that is very unfair. No wonder they initially refused to sign and I hope they got a better deal. Their sides may be the worst out of all the top flight professional teams but if they are funded less than everyone else that is even less likely to change.

[The Saint]

Yeah, I don't see how they can develop their game with that share. I was hoping to see an additional team from both nations too. Is there a 3-way split between the 3 league's though; 30/30/40?

[quinsforever]

1/3 to each league. With some kind Of smoothing over the first few years to guarantee rabo unions don't have to take a cut initially

[geoff998rugby]

There is an assumption of growth.

The Pro12 Unions are guaranteed a minimum of 20 million regardless of the size of the pot.
When the total pot reached 60 million (we are not there yet) they are guaranteed the next 4 million.

If it goes beyond 72 million it is 1/3 all the way upwards

[broadlandboy]

Figures I quoted are I believe the minimum they will get assured for 5 years. If as PRL/LNR predict that monies grow all leagues get equal. As Geoff said

[Notch]

I suppose that makes sense, given we don't know anything about the sponsorship deals the tournament will attract and how much they are worth.

[Scrumpy]

Is there any need to start another thread notch when there was one already started?

[Scrumpy]

The simplest way would be not to have seeding just use league places an allocate pool places accordingly.

So in Year 1 it might be AP-T14-P12 order meaning:
Pool 1     Pool 2     Pool 3    Pool 4    Pool 5
AP 1.      T14 1.     P12 1.    AP 2.    T14 2
P12 2.     AP 3.      T14  3.   P12 3.   AP.  4
T14 4.     P12 4.    AP.  5.    T14 5.   P12  5
AP  6.      T14. 6.   P12 6.    P12 7.   Play off

In Year 2 P12-AP-T14. In year 3 T14-P12-AP

This makes league places worth fighting for even once qualification is assured.

That looks simple!

[Notch]

This is just a continuation of the old thread. I can merge your thread into it if you like.

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