Ugly ducklings’ springboard to bigger success
Brendan Gallagher looks at how the Challenge Cup has been the launching pad for some big names
THE Challenge Cup can sometimes appear the ugly duckling of European Rugby – often under reported with some matches condemned to the Thursday night graveyard slot – but it has produced some belting rugby over the years and an invaluable vehicle for many clubs to build in advance on even sterner challenges.
After the inaugural Heineken Cup season (1995-96) the idea of a secondary European Cup competition quickly gained currency even if initially it all seemed one way traffic with the first four finals being allFrench affairs.
The scope of the fledgling competition was surprisingly ambitious – if ultimately unworkable – but for a brief while an unlikely group of clubs experienced European rugby and competitive matches abroad. Who, for example, remembers that Newbridge, Treorchy, Orrell, Dunvant, Nice, Neath, Caerphilly, Spain, Portugal, Rovigo and Aurillac all featured in the early years?
Not that the competition had a sponsor mind, that didn’t come until Parker Pen emerged as title sponsors in 2001 and supported the tournament for four years before Amlin stepped in for six years between 2009-14.
Those early years, with good reason, encouraged the thought that French rugby boasted much more strength in depth at club level which had a twofold affect. Some – in fact many – of the lesser clubs who were struggling to keep their heads above board in the professional game were swept aside never to be seen at this level again.
A few smaller clubs though – and Connacht would be the prime example – used the competition to relaunch their entire set-up and build some momentum and profile. Connacht never managed to win the competition but their European campaigns under Warren Gatland and Michael Bradley were their making as a club.
Under Gatland, the 1997-98 side become the first Irish side to win a European tie of any description in England, when they beat Northampton at Franklin’s Gardens, and later that season they became the first Ireland side to beat a French side in France when they won at BordeauxBegles. By the end of that campaign, which ended in a quarter-final defeat at Agen, Gatland had been appointed Ireland coach.
The French power also presented a challenge to the English sides. If they were going to compete they had to be pretty much at full bore, there could be no half measures and with that message on board we entered a period of six consecutive English winners.
Harlequins dug very deep to beat a star-studded Narbonne side 42-33 in a thrilling final at the Madejski Stadium and the following year an emerging Sale side took the trophy with a cracking win over a strong Pontypridd side, while in 2003 Wasps – with Gatland now in charge – were in imperious form as they swept all before them. In 2004 Quins sneaked past a Clermont side that were to become a power in the European Cup proper, and the following year Sale won at a canter against Pau. To nobody’s surprise Sale then stormed to the Premiership a year later.
The Challenge Cup was building a reputation as a launching pad to great things – Clermont certainly looked on it like that and a few years down the line that was certainly the case for a young emerging Quins side who claimed their third title when they squeezed past Stade Francais in the final at Cardiff.
The competition that year proved a brilliant finishing school for Quins. In the pool they had to overcome Bayonne – where they lost their first game – Connacht and Cavalieri from Italy before they really found their feet. In the quarter-finals they triumphed 32-22 against a pumped-up Wasps and in the semi-final they came of age beating Munster 20-12 at Thomond Park in a much more convincing fashion than the score line suggests.
Battle hardened from Europe, Quins were an altogether more confident outfit the following season in the Premiership when they made off with the title.
In 2014 Northampton, who had won in 2009, had the bit between their teeth and, as well as winning the Premiership, managed to win the Challenge Cup. This was one of those seasons when they were one of the three ‘best’ teams not to qualify for the quarter-finals of the Heineken Cup and therefore progressed to the quarter-finals of the Challenge Cup. In retrospect it was a zenith for Saints.