Champions Cup 2024

Exclamation Marc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121994637#Comment_121994637

From 2017 or 2012?

Might be hard to get face value at this stage tbh.

whiz

Sorry i meant i have a spare premium ticket for the Leinster - La Rochelle game, where can i sell it a cost price?

Exclamation Marc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121994804#Comment_121994804

I'd say Adverts or Toutless would be the best place.

Someone on Toutless looking for one premium ticket already!

https://www.toutless.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=43425

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121994804#Comment_121994804

If you bought it on Ticketmaster, you can apply for a refund (less their admin fee of course)

Edit: or not!

Exclamation Marc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121995935#Comment_121995935

There is an exclusion on the fan guarantee where bookings are within 14 days of the event.

CMcsporty

The SA teams are great for competitiveness

They have no business in Europe or URC. The amount of travel is just plain wrong.

pun intended

Buer

Whatever about LAR, it's far harder on the SA teams who have to do it regularly and often on the cheap. European teams do it as a once off and, for those in the URC, combine their two away games into a mini-camp.

ROG downplayed the travel this week saying that the players flew in business class and were all relaxed and rested. Compare that to the Bulls who have been split across 8 different routes from Johannesburg to get to the UK with some flying economy. They will only meet again as a group on Thursday.

If Northampton aren't riddled with that virus, it's hard to see past them winning.

Dillonb3

Jake White of the Bulls has already complained their travel to face Northampton is left to the last minute.

Same happened to Stormers last year when the team travelled in sepatate flights.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121997146#Comment_121997146

If Munster beat Saints, it would be Munster having to make last minute plans to head to SA.

In one sense, we're lucky as URC teams can't meet SA teams in the pool stages but heading to or from SA for one game is more than an inconvenience, especially when the weekends before and after have matches scheduled.

Billy_the_Kid

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121996491#Comment_121996491

L’travel c'est **** énorme !

Probably still less travel than if in Super Rugby

pickarooney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121997146#Comment_121997146

It's **** but they signed up for this

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121997847#Comment_121997847

I mean, SARU could have booked them on cancellable tickets weeks back…

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121997612#Comment_121997612

The Super Rugby format when SA were involved was that you played 4 "out of conference games" in the regular season. For SA teams this meant they did 4 game tours if their out of conference games were in Aus and NZ and 3 if they played Sunwolves (Tokyo) but Jaguares (Argentina) were in the SA conference so there was always 5 games outside of SA and 10 in SA.

In the URC/CC they play 8 games every season in Europe regularly, 2 Irish, 2 Welsh 2 Scots/Italians, 1 English and 1 French but the flip side is they now have 11 home games and 14 in SA in total instead of the 8 home and 11 SA games they had in SR

IN SR the SA teams would obviously fly to Australia and NZ in a full 3/4 week tour so minimum of 2 flights and another potentially across Aus and another to NZ. So min of 2 long haul returns, max of 3 plus flights between Aus/NZ. In the 2019 SR for example Sharks had a game in Singapore against Sunwolves, 2 games in NZ, one in Aus and one in Argentina.

In the URC/CC they usually do 4 game tours at the start of the season, 5 if the CC goes their way. This year for example Stormers played 4 Rounds of URC and Leicester Tigers in a 5 week tour. Back to SA then until January when they came up for 1 game and will be there until May. So they've effectively covered their regular season in 3 trips to Europe

So there's a little more travel, but the financial benefits are huge for them

Sheep Shagger

Leinster reporting there are only 10k tickets left for Saturday, am pleasently surprised they managed to sell that many so quickly.

Obviously helps that so many LAR fans live in Munster but jokes aside, it could even be a sell out.

CMcsporty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121997612#Comment_121997612

Chateauneuf du Pape

I'm more looking at it from a European pov. Flying to the bottom of Africa to play club games is insanity.

Burkie1203

Bulls spent €200k on flights for the QF

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121999247#Comment_121999247

This was how their flights were organised.

It was €204,853.72 in total at today's exchange rate, apparently. And thats not even all business class - it was "33 in business class and 5 in economy class."

Its an absolute mess, and just under €5400 per person is also horrific value.

You'd think SARU would be able to negotiate some sort of promotional / regular / group travel discount like.

Rugbyf565

So La Rochelle are staying in a 5 star resort in Cork with sports facilities. Probably says a lot about the resources at their disposal and the massive budgets they have to play with that they can stay in a 5 star resort for a week. Rog likes to play the underdog against the rich establishment card but it's complete rubbish, La Rochelle's budget is massive (over €30million) and they have incredible resources for playing and coaching. The actual narrative is La Rochelle (a big moneybags club) vs Leinster - a community club that develops its players from under 7 minis through to professional level.

pickarooney

And Leinster will be billeted in Soweto after taking the bus to Jo'burg

eagle eye

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121999535#Comment_121999535

I'm sorry but you are taking a lot of credit away from the bunch of schools that develop most of their rugby players.

St. Michaels, Blackrock, Clongowes Wood and St Andrews for example.

Leinster have a huge budget too, it's not like they were some poor club that had to drag themselves out of the doldrums.

AdamD

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121999888#Comment_121999888

Leinster aren't pretending to be a small club though

Blut2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121999888#Comment_121999888

St. Andrews…? You might want to double check the last few decades of Leinster player origins there. Any very rare players that came out of Andrews had more to do with their clubs than the school.

CMcsporty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121999300#Comment_121999300

Plus the travel alone generates about 1.9 tonnes of CO₂

Thats roughly the equivalent CO₂ for all of Leinsters Planes, Trains and Automobiles for their 16 away games in the 2011/12 season.

One tonne of CO₂ is roughly equivalent to 5,500 kms in a petrol car

African club teams should have no business playing in a European competition.

Lost Ormond

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122000787#Comment_122000787

Where do south africans play then. Its in europe or back with nz/aus.

CMcsporty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122000913#Comment_122000913

Back with nz/aus

Its the additional mileage European teams have to do that I have the issue with.

Lost Ormond

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122000924#Comment_122000924

They dont want that. Aussies and kiwis dont either. Its only 3 or 4 games if even a year where you may have to go to south africa

South africans need to play in europe and playing them is a tough challenge that should be welcomef not feared.

Blut2

The SA teams playing in NZ/AU, and the NZ/AU teams playing in SA, generates even more travel co2. The flight distances are far greater. And its far less commercially viable given the time zones on top.

Europe is where they have to play.

SARU just need to plan their logistics better. Some sort of sponsorship deal with BA or KLM with seats in lieu of cash would do wonders.

AbusesToilets

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122000913#Comment_122000913

The proper answer is that they play in a SA league, as they did prior to Super Rugby. Perhaps one that can expand to include some neighbouring teams from Zimbabwe and Namibia, and maybe further afield ( Kenya etc) .

It's unfortunate that rugby is such a prisoner to geography.

Lost Ormond

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122001737#Comment_122001737

It isnt the answer and would just see top players and many below that move to europe even more than now as they wouldnt be able to keep them if they played a south africann only league. Prior to super rugby wad the very earliest years of professionalism. Completwly different to now. Teams from namibia etc compwte in currie cup and not in top division in that. Theyre nowhere near ckmpetitive to play the top south african sides on regular basis right now

AbusesToilets

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122001903#Comment_122001903

Top players leave already, that's a reflection of economic differences between Europe and S. I like having the SA teams in the URC, but it's unequivocally an environmentally irresponsible situation. It's questionable how financially sustainable it will prove to be.