Champions Cup: London Irish star Rob Simmons leads calls for competition to become truly global

Champions Cup bosses have been urged to turn the tournament into a genuine global competition amid rugby’s continued worldwide reshuffle.

The Champions Cup will welcome South African teams for the first time this weekend, with the tournament’s European boundaries clearly breached by the southern hemisphere inclusion.

Champions Cup chiefs still want to push through with plans for a Club World Cup battle, to take place every four years, where European champions would take on the Super Rugby winners.

But London Irish’s Australia lock Rob Simmons has tipped global administrators to think bigger – and turn the Champions Cup into a genuine worldwide club contest.

Rugby bosses around the world continue to claim the global calendar alignment remains closer than ever, and Simmons sees no reason why the Champions Cup’s evolvement could not continue still further.

“I think it’s a fantastic idea, there would have to be a lot of thought put behind it to make sure it would keep its credibility,” Simmonds told Standard Sport.

“You don’t want to weaken the product too much. But it’s an interesting idea; you look at Japan, could they have a team? We don’t know until we try it. The logistics would be tough of course.

“We refer to it as Europe but really it’s spreading, it’s spreading over the globe and I really like that.”

Irish will launch their return to the Champions Cup by hosting Montpellier at the Gtech Community Stadium on Friday night, with Simmons packing down alongside fellow Wallabies star Adam Coleman at lock.

Simmons has long looked at the Champions Cup in awe from a distance, and now insisted Irish do want to waste the opportunity they have of playing in it.

“I would look at the Crusaders when I was in Australia, thinking they’d won Super Rugby and they were a brilliant team,” said Simmons.

“And I looked at Leinster then too, and I suppose I was biased because of the brand of rugby I was playing down south, but I reckoned then that the Crusaders would have beaten Leinster.

“But, you won’t know until they actually take each other on. And match-ups like that would be brilliant to see.

“Even just the winner of Super Rugby playing the winner of the Champions Cup would be amazing to see.

“But we’ve been watching this tournament from the south for so long, and we don’t get the opportunity to play a competition like this.

“Looking up here, it’s a clash of different competitions, and the competition changes every year because of qualification, so that aspect is pretty cool.

“We can’t wait to get going but we also know the size of the challenge.

“Some of the sides in this competition do have international players in every position, it would almost be an interesting game if they did play an international side.

“You’ve seen club sides pick off international sides, and that’s why.”

To book tickets for London Irish’s Heineken Champions Cup clash with Montpellier at the Gtech Community Stadium, log on to: https://www.eticketing.co.uk/londonirish