Inaugural United Rugby Championship winners, the Stormers, have been drawn in Pool 4 for next season’s Champions Cup, alongside European powerhouses La Rochelle, Stade Francais, Leicester Tigers, Leinster and Sale Sharks.
The Bulls will play in Pool 1 with Saracens, Bordeaux Begles, Bristol Bears, Connacht and Lyon.
The draw for the 2023/23 European Cup competitions was made at London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, venue for the finals on the weekend of 24 and 25 May 2024, on Wednesday.
Challenge Cup
In the second tier Challenge Cup competition, the Sharks, who featured in the Champions Cup lasst season, will play in Pool 1 with Pau, Dragons, Zebre, Oyannax and an Invitee.
The Lions, who will play in the Challenge Cup for the second time, are in Pool 2 alongside Ospreys, Perpignan, Newcastle, Montpellier and Benetton.
The Cheetahs could still get an invite to play in the Challenge Cup, as they did last season.
The draw was conducted under a new format and minus a title sponsor following Heineken’s decision to end its long-standing partnership with the competition.
Four matches home and away
The competition will no longer consist of two pools of 12 teams, as it was during the Covic years and last season.
Next season’s Champions Cup will feature four pools of six teams each, each pool containing two teams from each of the French Top14, English Premiership and United Rugby Championship (URC). Yet each team will play four pool matches against four different teams not from the same league, two at home and two away.
A further tweak sees teams from the same URC Shield kept apart in the pool stages, meaning Ireland’s four provinces were drawn into separate pools, as were South Africa participants the Stormers and the Bulls.
Pools
Champions Cup
Pool 1: Saracens, Bordeaux Begles, Bulls, Bristol Bears, Connacht, Lyon
Pool 2: Toulouse, Cardiff, Bath, Racing 92, Harlequins, Ulster
Pool 3: Munster, Bayonne, Glasgow, Exeter Chiefs, Toulon, Northampton
Pool 4: La Rochelle, Stade Francais, Leicester Tigers, DHL Stormers, Leinster, Sale Sharks
Challenge Cup
Pool 1: Invitee 1, Section Paloise, Dragons, Zebre, Cell C Sharks, Oyannax
Pool 2: Ospreys, Perpignan, Newcastle, Emirates Lions, Montpellier, Benetton
Pool 3: Edinburgh, Castres Olympique, Clermont Auvergne, Invitee 2, Gloucester, Scarlets
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