2007–08 Heineken Cup
| 2007–08 Heineken Cup | |||
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Official logo
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| Tournament details | |||
| Countries |
 England France Ireland Italy Scotland Wales
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| Tournament format(s) | Round-robin and Knockout | ||
| Date | 9 November 2007 to 24 May 2008 | ||
| Tournament statistics | |||
| Teams | 24 | ||
| Matches played | 79 | ||
| Attendance | 942,373 (11,929 per match) | ||
| Top point scorer(s) |
Glen Jackson (Saracens) (123 points) |
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| Top try scorer(s) |
Vincent Clerc (Toulouse) Richard Haughton (Saracens) Kameli Ratuvou (Saracens) Aurélien Rougerie (Clermont) (5 tries) |
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| Final | |||
| Venue | Millennium Stadium, Cardiff | ||
| Attendance | 74,417 | ||
| Champions |
Munster (2nd title) |
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| Runner-up |
Toulouse
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| Official website | http://www.ercrugby.com/eng/ | ||
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The 2007–08 Heineken Cup was the 13th edition of the Heineken Cup, the annual rugby union European club competition for clubs from the top six nations in European rugby.
The start of the tournament was delayed because of the 2007 Rugby World Cup. After much doubt over the competition's future, caused by the threat of English and French clubs not participating, showdown talks ensured that teams from both countries would be competing in the 2007–08 tournament. The cup was won by Munster, who succeeded London Wasps as European champions after a 16–13 win over Toulouse in the final at Cardiff's Millennium Stadium.
The Italo-Celtic Playoff was a match played between the highest-placed Magners League team not automatically qualified for the Heineken Cup and the third-placed Italian team to decide the 24th qualifying team. This year, the match was between Newport Gwent Dragons of Wales and Calvisano.
Seven English teams participated, as an English team, London Wasps, progressed farther in the previous year's tournament than any French or Italian team.
Four Welsh teams competed, as a Welsh team won the Italo-Celtic playoff.
Other nations have their usual number of participants: France six, Ireland three, Italy two and Scotland two.
Each of the six participating nations nominated a top seed:
The draw then progressed as follows, with at no stage except the last a team being drawn into a pool containing a team from the same nation:
The pools are shown below.
In the pool matches, teams receive:
Ties between two teams are broken in the following order:
The quarter-finals are seeded from 1 to 8. The six pool winners receive the top six seeds, based on their point totals. The top two second-place finishers are seeded 7 and 8. The seeds of the qualifying teams are in parentheses next to their names in the tables.
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