2018-2019 Champions Cup

troyzer

Buer wrote: »

troyzer wrote: »

Currently four teams in each group. Home and away = six games/six weekends.

Three teams in each group. Home and away = four games/four weekends.

4 games, 4 weekends....plus 2 weekends where one of the sides is idle.

It's not about the length of the tournament.

It's about the amount of weekends the teams actually play.

irishbucsfan

troyzer wrote: »

It's not about the length of the tournament.

It's about the amount of weekends the teams actually play.

Ha, it’s absolutely about the length of the tournament

Podge_irl

irishbucsfan wrote: »

And how exactly do you play a 4-game per 3-team pool over any fewer weekends?

You also can’t fit a 3 team pool into 16 teams

In other words, my entire point here is that this is just someone scrambling together rumors and an unconnected interview and then padding it out with brexit

5 team groups with home or away would work.

However, he doesn't go into details about group sizes. He does very explicitly state the goal is to reduce game weeks.

troyzer

irishbucsfan wrote: »

troyzer wrote: »

It's not about the length of the tournament.

It's about the amount of weekends the teams actually play.

Ha, it’s absolutely about the length of the tournament

The entire premise of this article was player welfare.

Weeks off are what matters.

OldRio

Well, that didn't take long. Usual positions maintained.

irishbucsfan

troyzer wrote: »

The entire premise of this article was player welfare.

Weeks off are what matters.

They won’t be weeks off. It doesn’t work.

You’re missing the underlying reason for all of this, which is the global season and the need to reduce the footprint of the overall club rugby calendar.

There really wasn’t an entire premise of the article. It was all over the place. The entire premise of what Halliday said specifically was player welfare, but he also conveniently enough said nothing at all about shortening the competition.

troyzer

irishbucsfan wrote: »

They won’t be weeks off. It doesn’t work.

You’re missing the underlying reason for all of this, which is the global season and the need to reduce the footprint of the overall club rugby calendar.

There really wasn’t an entire premise of the article. It was all over the place. The entire premise of what Halliday said specifically was player welfare, but he also conveniently enough said nothing at all about shortening the competition.

You're probably right about the global calendar. It seems to be the long term goal but again there's form on the English being awkward on this.

irishbucsfan

Podge_irl wrote: »

5 team groups with home or away would work.

However, he doesn't go into details about group sizes. He does very explicitly state the goal is to reduce game weeks.

It wouldn’t work.

Bye weeks don’t work because there are huge variances in the suitability of available game weeks. Especially when you then have to turn around to European/domestics rights holders individually and explain they’re now competing with each other on the same weekends.

Home or away scheduling doesn’t really work because it’s massively inequitable.

You could remove the pools altogether. I don’t think anyone wants that but it’d be the fairest and most realistic way to reduce game weeks.

This is just a shot in the dark from the guardian and my own opinion is that it’s based entirely on the RFUs inability to get any movement at all out of PRL on reducing their own season length before 2020.

aloooof

troyzer wrote: »

It's easy for us to **** on the Premiership and laud the Pro14 as the superior league because of how often Pro14 teams win in Europe...

Baffling post. Who has been doing this?! You also seem to be completely excluding / forgetting Saracens and Toulon's victories.

As recently as 2016, there were no Pro14 sides in the Quarter Final. In 2015 there was one. These things are cyclical.

troyzer

aloooof wrote: »

Baffling post. Who has been doing this?! You also seem to be completely excluding / forgetting Saracens and Toulon's victories.

As recently as 2016, there were no Pro14 sides in the Quarter Final. These things are cyclical.

I wasn't talking about the French teams and I set Saracens aside because they're the only English team with the depth to compete in both competitions.

I'm aware these things are cyclical.

AdamD

This is not about player welfare, lets be honest.

aloooof

troyzer wrote: »

I wasn't talking about the French teams and I set Saracens aside because they're the only English team with the depth to compete in both competitions.

I'm aware these things are cyclical.

You were making out like there was an amazing period of Pro14 dominance when that just isn't the case. French teams are part of that picture.

Podge_irl

irishbucsfan wrote: »

It wouldn’t work.

Bye weeks don’t work because there are huge variances in the suitability of available game weeks. Especially when you then have to turn around to European/domestics rights holders individually and explain they’re now competing with each other on the same weekends.

Home or away scheduling doesn’t really work because it’s massively inequitable.

You could remove the pools altogether. I don’t think anyone wants that but it’d be the fairest and most realistic way to reduce game weeks.

This is just a shot in the dark from the guardian and my own opinion is that it’s based entirely on the RFUs inability to get any movement at all out of PRL on reducing their own season length before 2020.

I agree, I don't think any of it will work.

Kitson is definitely suggesting reducing game weeks though. Halliday's comments are far less clear cut. It is also super unclear where exactly Kitson is getting his info from. The article is a bit of a mess.

Former Former

Ah lads.

The thrust of the article is "everything is up for renegotiation". Format, number of teams, commercial terms, whether it continues at all. This was always going to happen, it has to happen and indeed it happened every few years during the lifetime of the old Heineken Cup.

Reducing the number of teams is probably one of a lengthy shopping list of suggestions, some of which are good ideas and some of which make no sense. It doesn't mean that there's any weight behind it.

I'm wasting my breath here, I know. Horse has bolted.

Squidgy Black

Former Former wrote: »

Ah lads.

The thrust of the article is "everything is up for renegotiation". Format, number of teams, commercial terms, whether it continues at all. This was always going to happen, it has to happen and indeed it happened every few years during the lifetime of the old Heineken Cup.

Reducing the number of teams is probably one of a lengthy shopping list of suggestions, some of which are good ideas and some of which make no sense. It doesn't mean that there's any weight behind it.

I'm wasting my breath here, I know. Horse has bolted.

It's literally just a discussion between stakeholders because the commercial agreements are up for review in 3 years. I've no idea how people fell for the clickbait aspect of the article saying things will change and that it's critical. The only 'critical' thing is getting the commercials in line.

AdamD

Former Former wrote: »

Ah lads.

The thrust of the article is "everything is up for renegotiation". Format, number of teams, commercial terms, whether it continues at all. This was always going to happen, it has to happen and indeed it happened every few years during the lifetime of the old Heineken Cup.

Reducing the number of teams is probably one of a lengthy shopping list of suggestions, some of which are good ideas and some of which make no sense. It doesn't mean that there's any weight behind it.

I'm wasting my breath here, I know. Horse has bolted.

I could definitely get behind a change in format. The current one, whilst it produces many great games and scenarios also has situations where decent sides are effectively throwing in the towel after 2/3 games because they started poorly.

troyzer

aloooof wrote: »

You were making out like there was an amazing period of Pro14 dominance when that just isn't the case. French teams are part of that picture.

I agree with you. I was talking about the many people who think that three Pro14 teams in one year's semi final means that the Pro14 is the best league.

I don't think they're right.

sydthebeat

troyzer wrote: »

I agree with you. I was talking about the many people who think that three Pro14 teams in one year's semi final means that the Pro14 is the best league.

I don't think they're right.

and 2 years ago there were 3 premiership teams in the semi finals...
ergo thats the best league?

or the fact theres pretty much constantly at least one french team in the semis, ergo thats the best league??

troyzer

sydthebeat wrote: »

and 2 years ago there were 3 premiership teams in the semi finals...
ergo thats the best league?

or the fact theres pretty much constantly at least one french team in the semis, ergo thats the best league??

It's illogical, you're right.

stephen_n

AdamD wrote: »

I could definitely get behind a change in format. The current one, whilst it produces many great games and scenarios also has situations where decent sides are effectively throwing in the towel after 2/3 games because they started poorly.

How could the format be changed to avoid that? That’s pretty much true of all knockout competitions.

errlloyd

stephen_n wrote: »

How could the format be changed to avoid that? That’s pretty much true of all knockout competitions.

The problem isn't teams throwing in the towel. The problem is actually that teams throwing in the towel effects other teams. The flaws in the format are so often overlooked because the competition is so damn good, but the biggest problem is that getting a home quarter, and now a home semi, is hugely dependent on how hard your group is. How hard your group is turns out to be less dependent on how good your opposition is, and more dependent on how much they give a crap.

For example, if Ulster do Leinster a favour and beat Racing by 7, and Leinster beat Toulose, Leinster and Racing will be tied on 19 going into week 5. In that scenario the chances are that the team that gets the home semi final will be decided by whether or not Wasps send out the seconds. If Wasps throw the game against Leinster there is a good chance we get a TBP, and Racing can't catch our PD.

Why is it fair that Racing's chances in this competition are significantly dependent on a third party team giving a ****?

stephen_n

errlloyd wrote: »

Why is it fair that Racing's chances in this competition are significantly dependent on a third party team giving a ****?

But they aren't, they're dependent on Racing winning against Ulster. The other permutations only come into play if Racing fail in their primary functions to win games.

OldRio

#Donning tin foil hat#
Top tier domestic leagues ditched. A new pan European format, eg Conferences.
Less games, better player welfare. Increase in Sponsorship. International teams benefit because of rested players and better opposition.
TV money floods in.

I'd imagine the owners would go for that but?

aloooof

errlloyd wrote: »

...the biggest problem is that getting a home quarter, and now a home semi, is hugely dependent on how hard your group is. How hard your group is turns out to be less dependent on how good your opposition is, and more dependent on how much they give a crap.

It's a difficult one to solve tho, not really sure what they could implement to avoid this.

It's currently better than it was 2-3 years ago at least, when the Italian teams automatically got a spot. Before the reduction to 20 teams, the 6 pool winners and 2 best runners-up would qualify, one of which would invariably be the pool with the Italian team.

I wonder if Bennetton had been performing as well as they are now if that rule would have been changed?

awec

Teams have to select from their European squad for every game, so they can't really field properly weak teams.

The problem is not so much weak selections, it's just teams phoning it in cause they can't be arsed. The only way to solve that is for a teams performance in the competition to have an affect on their future participation in some way. In football this is done through individual teams coefficient/seedings, which is an algorithm similar to the World Rugby ranking for unions except way more complex. Not sure how this would work in rugby, the format of the competition is much more restricted.

OldRio

OldRio wrote: »

#Donning tin foil hat#
Top tier domestic leagues ditched. A new pan European format, eg Conferences.
Less games, better player welfare. Increase in Sponsorship. International teams benefit because of rested players and better opposition.
TV money floods in.

I'd imagine the owners would go for that but?

The "but" is risk.

You are asking not one but three competitions to cease and be replaced with a completely new venture.

If people don't take to it then the sport is in serious trouble.

The other aspect is the stakeholders. It's three competitions but the French Italian, South African, Irish, Welsh, Scottish and English stakeholder all need to come on board.

If it happens it would be seriously staggered.

stephen_n

OldRio wrote: »

#Donning tin foil hat#
Top tier domestic leagues ditched. A new pan European format, eg Conferences.
Less games, better player welfare. Increase in Sponsorship. International teams benefit because of rested players and better opposition.
TV money floods in.

I'd imagine the owners would go for that but?

But the clubs are stakeholders, unless there are going to 42 teams involved, some of them would be sure to object.

awec

Pro14 unions will never give up control of their league. IRFU would never give up the convenient interpro scheduling and the ability to enforce weak teams whenever they see fit.

awec

awec wrote: »

Pro14 unions will never give up control of their league. IRFU would never give up the convenient interpro scheduling and the ability to enforce weak teams whenever they see fit.

You really do need to stop stating this as fact.

It might be true, it probably is partially true in a very limited way but ultimately we see plenty of squad rotation during certain windows that is just as easily explained as squad rotation.

Either way, it's far down the list of reasons why the IRFU will be slow to jump on board a major shift in European rugby so I'm not sure what the merit of bringing it into this conversation is - other than it being a current bugbear of yours!

awec

Deleted User wrote: »

You really do need to stop stating this as fact.

It might be true, it probably is partially true in a very limited way but ultimately we see plenty of squad rotation during certain windows that is just as easily explained as squad rotation.

Either way, it's far down the list of reasons why the IRFU will be slow to jump on board a major shift in European rugby so I'm not sure what the merit of bringing it into this conversation is - other than it being a current bugbear of yours!

It is squad rotation.

It happens at the time when teams know their opposition have to rotate their squad as well.