Warriors urged to play to the whistle

Wilson tells Glasgow stars they need to turn up for full 80 minutes.

GLASGOW Warriors will face joint European and English Premiership champions Exeter Chiefs in the pool stage of this season’s Heineken Champions Cup, meaning a reunion with former players Stuart Hogg and Jonny Gray.

They will also play last season’s French Top 14 runners- up Lyon, in an abbreviated pool stage which has been introduced for this season only to cope with the scheduling challenges presented by Covid.

Edinburgh have been drawn against Sale Sharks and La Rochelle.

It is the second consecutive season that Warriors and Chiefs have been drawn together in the Champions Cup, with the Devon outfit winning 34- 18 at Sandy Park before a 31- 31 draw at Scotstoun during the pool stage of last year’s competition. Exeter ended up topping the pool and went on to lift the trophy for the first time by beating Finn Russell’s Racing 92 in the final two and a half weeks ago.

Warriors head coach Danny Wilson acknowledged that his draw presents his team with a huge challenge to overcome if they are to reach the knockout stages but insisted that his squad have nothing to fear.

“Exeter are a star- studded team when they’ve got all their internationalists available to them, but likewise when we’ve got all our internationals available to us we’re a very strong looking team as well and you saw the start of that in the Scarlets game before they all disappeared to the Scotland camp,” he said. “It will be good to get our internationalists back for the European campaign against really strong opposition. Those are the games we all want to be part of and look forward to.”

The tournament includes only four games at the pool stage.