Gerry Thornley joins Nathan Johns to explore what can be done

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Toulouse's French scrum-half Antoine Dupont lifts the trophy as Toulouse players celebrate their win over Leinster in the 2024 Champions Cup final. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP via Getty Images
Toulouse's French scrum-half Antoine Dupont lifts the trophy as Toulouse players celebrate their win over Leinster in the 2024 Champions Cup final. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP via Getty Images

The Champions Cup is not the competition it used to be. For all Munster’s recent trips to France provided a feel-good window of sport at its best, plenty of dead rubber ties reminded us that it is difficult to get the best of the best facing off in truly competitive ties. That the pool stages have featured too many hammerings on the scoreboard to be a proper competition has been true for some time. That such drubbings continue until the quarter-final stage is worrying. Plenty of column inches and podcast segments have been dedicated to calling out the issue for what it is, but what are the solutions?

Gerry Thornley joins Nathan Johns to explore what can be done. How did it get to this stage in the first place? Are the English clubs truly dedicated to the competition? How have TV rights issues played into the problem? How can we fix the Champions Cup?

Produced by John Casey.

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