Nick Cain: Europe’s suddenly got a lot tougher for the Irish

Soon after Brian O’Driscoll had been revealed as the latest jewel in BT Sport’s ever-expanding crown of former international pundits he touched on what could be the biggest sea-change this season. Eyeing up the action ahead for the Irish provinces in the Pro 12 and new European Champions Cup, O’Driscoll reflected quietly that they were going to have to be competitive from the start to finish this season – in a way that they never were before his retirement.
In other words, the privilege the Celtic nations enjoyed of being able to rest top players like O’Driscoll at will during the season is over. Until this campaign, Irish players like O’Driscoll emerged only for the serious business of the early rounds of the Heineken Cup in mid-October, before moving on to participate in the autumn internationals, followed by the crucial home and away Heineken pool rounds in December. After that there would be another short rest before the Six Nations training camps.
Those privileges have now vanished along with the flawed Heineken Cup structure that propped them up. Now,the Irish, Welsh, Scots and Italians are going to have to go at it eyeballs-out from the first week in September to the last week in May, just as their English and French counterparts have always done.
This has been brought about by the new qualifying format for the European Champions Cup, the competition that has supplanted the Heineken. The ring-fenced sinecures guarded so jealously by the Celtic Unions have been dismantled, with the weaker teams in the Pro12, such as Zebre and Connacht,  at long last dropping down into the second tier European Challenge Cup where, for the moment, they belong.
Meanwhile, the Pro 12 contingent in the European Champions Cup has been reduced from 11 teams to seven. This has resulted in a league which was muted throughout most of the 19 seasons the Heineken Cup was in existence, suddenly being invested with new energy. Now, as opposed to being a glorified training run, every match is for something, because only the best placed team from each of the four countries qualifies for the following season’s European Champions Cup.
The next three places go to the highest ranked teams who have not already qualified – and then there is a further chance to qualify for one of two further Celt-Italian sides if they can beat their English and French adversaries in a play-off.
Having long been an advocate for a more competitive Pro 12 structure being in the best interests of all the Celt-Italian countries, as well as their players coaches and supporters, I am not changing tune now.
However, it may take quite a period of adjustment before we see a European Champions Cup with a three-years-out-of-four winning side like Leinster, or two- years-out-of-three like Munster. Put simply, their players are going to have to acquire the durability needed to fight on two fronts and get used to playing 30 games a season.
My other hope is that rather than turning the Pro 12 into a halfway house, they make it a full meritocracy by getting rid of guaranteed places for each nation, and do it sooner rather than later. Unless a country can get one club into the top six they should have no guarantee of European Champions Cup rugby. Instead, let the place go to whoever merits it. So, if for arguments sake, there are three Irish, three Welsh, and one Scottish side in the top seven, let them play in the Champions Cup –  and everyone else, including both Italian teams, take their place in the Challenge Cup.
Italy, and Scotland for that matter, have had plenty of time to produce a competitive club side, and the favoured nation status should be ditched so that they stand on their own merits.
*This article was first published in The Rugby Paper on September 14.