European Rugby 2023-24

Just saw this from last Friday's Telegraph.

It is understood that the new format will include 24 teams competing in four pools of six, and with the opening two rounds taking place in December. Each pool will comprise two clubs from each of the three competing leagues – the Premiership, United Rugby Championship and Top 14, drawn on a ranking basis. Clubs from the same league in each pool will not play against each other, resulting in four pool matches

Based on that it would seem to suggest that it won't be home and away, we would play two English and two French sides, one of each at home, but I could be reading that wrong, or they could have picked it up wrong.
Though it does suggest that we won't necessarily be playing all our games against finalists, with more of an even distribution of teams instead.


www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union/2023/05/...-format-next-season/

... but isn't that effectively the exact same format as this season? Except that the pool is split in half. In the above case you would be guaranteed that two Pot 4 sides would make the playoffs (quite likely without winning any games).
I saw some references to an article in the (London) Times that said home and away was gone but didn't read the full thing.
Though in both cases these articles were written in advance of an alleged meeting over the weekend, so something entirely different could have been decided there!

I was assuming the format change would be aimed at making it less batS#!+ as opposed to more ...
But this is EPCR so who knows.
I do have to admire the optimism of a Munster fan who feels entitled to play 3 of his 4 games at home
I would assume that whatever the details of the format each team would play one higher ranked and one lower ranked team from each of the other leagues.
And the one thing that you can say for certain is that everyone will play the same number of home games in the pool stage, I don't think even EPCR will go that far off the reservation.

Simon Massie-Taylor on GBR podcast confirmed the new format as above - four pools of six, where you play four of the five other teams - with final details to be worked out over the next week or so. Nothing really new there as PRL were presumably the source for the original stories, but it does mean that it wasn't shot down at the weekend, and the fact that he is saying it in interviews and not giving the usual <<nothing is agreed until everything is agreed>> suggests it's probably a runner.

So I'm going to go ahead and pick our pool:
Munster
Connacht
La Rochelle
Bayonne
Leicester
Harlequins

We beat Quins at home and Bayonne away and then beat Stade Francais away in the last 16 or something along those lines.

Yes, I think that is the case. If it works the way I guess it will then the two teams from a given league in each pool will be from the opposite seeding, e.g. Connacht as 7th seed would be with Munster or Stormers and Ulster as 4th would be with Glasgow/Bulls. That would guarantee balance to the pools. So as you say a higher seeding doesn't give you easier games. So in that way it would be one of the fairer systems we've had.
There will be some anomalies e.g. one of Munster/Stormers would be in the same pool as Cardiff meaning all their Anglo-French rivals will have a theoretically handy enough game against the Welsh side while the URC team have a tougher fixture list, but that is a flaw of the qualification and seeding system as opposed to the format. It would be arguably worse under the other systems where some lucky teams get Cardiff twice.
(Of course Cardiff may have a great season and I for one fully expect them to beat Saracens and not pin this post to the wall when we meet them in the Quarter Final)

I wonder does the radio silence from EPCR perhaps indicate that the new format indicated by PRL might not be a done deal? Barely even a leak or any random speculation for three weeks.
It was this day last year that they confirmed the format for this season so maybe we'll get it soon ...

So other than the Top seeds (La Rochelle, Saracens, Munster and Toulouse/Leinster) it's a completely open draw. I must say I wasn't expecting that curveball even from EPCR.
So all our fretting about the seeding order was a moot point. Only winning the league would have gotten us anywhere.
So we could get Toulouse, La Rochelle, Saracens and Sale
Or equally La Rochelle, Bayonne, Bath and Bristol
Bit of a difference there.

So the immediate question is who do we want to win the Top 14 final on Saturday?
If Toulouse win, we will play one of Toulouse, La Rochelle or Saracens
If La Rochelle win, we will play either La Rochelle or Saracens

Of the three I would prefer La Rochelle as we play Toulouse too often and frankly I could do without Saracens in my life right now.
A La Rochelle win would mean we would have a higher chance of getting them, but also a higher chance of getting Saracens.
I think I'll go for a La Rochelle win as the better option. Even if we get Saracens, that increases our chances of getting one (or even two) of the more beatable French teams like Bayonne or Lyon.

The rule about not being in the same pool as the other Irish teams makes no sense to me since we can't play them anyway. It means Cardiff, etc., have a good chance of avoiding all the top seeds but we don't.

This will take time to digest ...

This is my favourite part of the press release :

"Fixtures will be determined using an algorithm which will take into consideration the pool draws, league calendar restrictions, individual club calendar restrictions and broadcast requirements"

What in the hell does that even mean? In this case the fixture list is hugely important, as it will determine which teams you play at home and which away, and that will be done behind closed doors with no accountability or transparency. In my @r$€ there is an algorithm ...

In retrospect maybe Toulouse winning was better as it least it rules out being drawn with both of them ...

rugby.connacht.pink/?p=143

Not far off my ideal draw. Would have preferred Bayonne to Bordeaux but the lack of seeding really worked in our favour.
All the teams in Leinster's pool finished in the top 4 in their league regular season, whereas only two of ours did ...