2017-18 European Rugby Champions Cup
| 2017–18 European Rugby Champions Cup | |
|---|---|
| Tournament details | |
| Countries |
 England France Ireland Italy Scotland Wales
|
| Tournament format(s) | Round-robin and knockout |
| Date | 13 October 2017 – 12 May 2018 |
| Tournament statistics | |
| Teams | 20 |
| Matches played | 64 |
| Attendance | 880,226 (13,754 per match) |
| Highest Attendance | 51,700 – Leinster v Saracens (1 April 2018) |
| Lowest Attendance | 2,600 – Benetton v Scarlets (16 December 2017) |
| Tries scored | 354 (5.53 per match) |
| Top point scorer(s) |
Owen Farrell (Saracens) (92 points) |
| Top try scorer(s) |
Daniel Evans (Ospreys) Nemani Nadolo (Montpellier) (6 tries) |
| Final | |
| Venue | San Mamés Stadium, Bilbao |
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The 2017–18 European Rugby Champions Cup is the fourth European Rugby Champions Cup championship, the annual rugby union club competition for teams from the top six nations in European rugby and is the twenty-third season of pan-European professional club rugby competition.
The format of the competition began with a play-off qualification round at the end of the preceding season featuring teams from England, France, Ireland and Wales. The winner joined 19 teams already qualified by way of their domestic league position in the pool stage of the competition - a home and away round-robin for five groups of four teams. Following the pool stage, five pool winners, and three highest ranked runners-up, qualified for the quarter-finals of the competition, as the Cup thereafter reverted to a single elimination knockout format.
The tournament began on 13 October 2017. The final will take place on 12 May 2018 at San Mamés Stadium in Bilbao, Spain. This will be the first time the final has been held outside one of the Six Nations countries.
Twenty clubs from the three major European domestic and regional leagues will compete in the Champions Cup. Nineteen of these will qualify directly as a result of their league performance.
The distribution of teams is:
The following teams have qualified for the 2017–18 tournament.
The play-off system that had been suspended the season before, due to the 2015 Rugby World Cup, returned to decide the final team competing in the Champions Cup.
Four clubs competed in a play-off to decide the final team in the Champions Cup.
The play-off comprised 3 matches, contested by one team from the Aviva Premiership, one from the Top 14, and two from the Guinness Pro12.
The two Pro12 teams played either the Premiership or Top 14 side in a single-leg semi-final, held at the home ground of the non-Pro12 side. The winners of these matches then played in a play-off final, and the winner of this match took the 20th place in the Champions Cup. The three losing teams will all compete in the 2017–18 European Rugby Challenge Cup.
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