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Investec Champions Cup quarter-final draw confirmed
By Jon Newcombe
The quarter-final draw for the 2024/25 Investec Champions Cup is now complete, with five former winners making it through to the last eight.
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Four teams from France’s Top 14 are still in the running for the prized silverware (Bordeaux-Begles, Toulon, Toulouse and Castres, three from the URC – two from Ireland (Leinster and Munster), one from Scotland (Glasgow Warriors) – and one from the Gallagher Premiership (Northampton).
Two of the four ties see teams play against each other in the competition for the first time, including a local French derby, another pits together two very familiar foes, while there is also a top-of-the-table URC clash to look forward to next weekend.
Six-time champions Toulouse, the most successful team in the history of the competition, were the last of the eight teams to book their place, beating Sale Sharks 38-15 at Stadium de Toulouse on Sunday afternoon. The six-time winners’ reward is a short trip to Toulon, who lifted the trophy three years in a row between 2013-15.
The other Sunday match went the way of Bordeaux-Begles, a 43-31 victory over Ulster seeing them face another Irish province, Munster, in the quarter-finals.
On Friday night, Northampton, winners in 2000, kept their season alive with a 46-24 win at home to Clermont Auvergne. They’ll now be at home to familiar opponents in Castres.
The Saints-Clermont game set the tone for a series of high-scoring matches in the Round of 16, with Toulon overcoming a 22-point deficit to beat Saracens 74-42 in the first of five matches on Saturday.
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Leinster destroyed Harlequins in the next game and will be at home to Glasgow Warriors, who beat Leicester 43-19 later that evening.
Sandwiched between those one-sided contests were two hotly-contested affairs, as Castres edged a determined Benetton, 39-37, and Munster just about held on for a 25-24 win, with Jack Crowley’s drop goal – only the second in this season’s competition – proving crucial.
Leinster and Glasgow will kick off what promises to be another exhilarating weekend with a Friday night game at the Aviva Stadium on April 11th.
While no strangers to each other in the United Rugby Championship and its various other incarnations over the years, this will be the first time the teams have met in the Champions Cup since 2017/18 and the first time in the knockout stages.
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Leinster have won the last seven ties meetings with Glasgow’s only success coming in the first encounter in the 1999/00 season, when the Scottish capital outfit – then known as Glasgow Caledonians – won 29-17 at Hughenden.
Leinster are four-times winners of the competition, while Glasgow have never made it beyond the quarter-finals before. The teams haven’t met yet in the league in 2024/25, with Leinster hosting Glasgow on the final day of the regular season, on May 17th.
Meanwhile, Castres are Saints’ most frequent opponents in the Champions Cup, with Saturday’s quarter-final tie being the 12th time they have met in the competition – all in the last 15 years – but this will be the first in the knockout stages.
Saints maintained their dominant record in the fixture when they beat Castres for the seventh time, 38-8 in Pool 3 back in December.
Toulon vs Toulouse is a match between two teams steeped in Champions Cup history, but surprisingly, this is the first time the fierce rivals have met in the competition. Toulouse won 57-5 in the Top 14 at the end of October, Ange Capuozzo scoring a hat-trick of tries.
Capuozzo, however, won’t feature in the return match, having been stretchered off the field with a serious-looking injury in the second half of the Sale game.
After winning the ‘O’Gara derby’, Munster face another former fly-half in Joey Carbery, who is now pulling the strings for Bordeaux-Begles, their hosts in the quarter-finals.
In another first for the Champions Cup, Stade Chaban-Delmas should be rocking when two of the best-supported sides meet for the first time in the competition.
Munster, the lowest seeds (eighth) won the last of their two titles in 2008, while Top 14 high-flyers Bordeaux-Begles, who are number one seeds, are still waiting for their first piece of EPCR silverware.
2024-25 Investec Champions Cup quarter-final draw (seeds in brackets)
Friday April 11th
QF2: Leinster (2) vs. Glasgow Warriors (7), KO 20:00, Aviva Stadium
Saturday April 12th
QF1: Bordeaux-Begles (1) v Munster (9), KO 16:00, Stade Chaban Delmas
QF3: Northampton (3) vs. Castres (6), KO 17:30, Franklin’s Gardens
Sunday, April 13th
QF4: Toulon (4) v Toulouse (5), KO 16:00, Stade Felix Mayol
Semi-finals – May 2/3/4
SF 1: Winner QF 1 v Winner QF 4
SF 2: Winner QF 2 v Winner QF 3
The matches will be played in Europe, and the highest-ranked clubs from the pool stage will have home country advantage.
Kick-off times are local.
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