2010–11 Heineken Cup
| 2010–11 Heineken Cup | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Tournament details | |||
| Countries |
 England France Ireland Italy Scotland Wales
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| Tournament format(s) | Round-robin and Knockout | ||
| Date | 8 October 2010 – 21 May 2011 | ||
| Tournament statistics | |||
| Teams | 24 | ||
| Matches played | 79 | ||
| Attendance | 1,139,427 (14,423 per match) | ||
| Top point scorer(s) |
Jonathan Sexton (Leinster) (138 points) |
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| Top try scorer(s) |
Paul Diggin (Northampton) (6 tries) |
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| Final | |||
| Venue | Millennium Stadium, Cardiff | ||
| Attendance | 72,456 | ||
| Champions | Leinster (2nd title) | ||
| Runner-up | Northampton Saints | ||
| Official website | http://www.ercrugby.com/eng/ | ||
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The 2010–11 Heineken Cup was the 16th season of the Heineken Cup, the annual rugby union European club competition for clubs from the top six nations in European rugby. It started with three matches on 8 October 2010 and ended on 21 May 2011 with the final at Cardiff's Millennium Stadium where Leinster beat Northampton Saints 33 – 22.
The default allocation of teams is as follows:
The remaining two places are filled by the winners of the previous year's Heineken Cup and Amlin Challenge Cup. If the cup winners are already qualified through their domestic league, an additional team from their country will claim a Heineken Cup place (assuming another team is available). The only exception is when teams from England or France win both cups, which did not happen in 2009–10.
Because 2010 Heineken Cup winners Toulouse were already qualified for this season's Heineken Cup by virtue of their fourth-place regular-season finish in the 2009–10 Top 14, the extra place for France went to seventh-placed Biarritz (who were also Toulouse's defeated opponent in the Heineken Cup Final). Because Amlin Challenge Cup winners Cardiff Blues were already qualified for the Heineken Cup by finishing second among the four Welsh teams in the 2009–10 Celtic League, the extra Welsh place went to the lowest-placed Welsh team in the league, Scarlets.
The seeding system was the same as in the 2009–10 tournament. The 24 competing teams are ranked based on past Heineken Cup and European Challenge Cup performance, with each pool receiving one team from each quartile, or Tier. The requirement to have only one team per country in each pool, however, still applies (with the exception of the inclusion of the seventh French team).
The brackets show each team's European Rugby Club Ranking at the end of the 2009–10 season. Aironi inherited the ranking of Viadana, the principal shareholders in the new Celtic League team.
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