Saints set to find out Champions Cup fate

Saints will be in the Champions Cup draw on Wednesday afternoon

Saints are back in the Champions Cup - and they will find out who they will face in the pool stages when the draw takes place in Switzerland on Wednesday afternoon.

The draw will begin at approximately 1.20pm and will be streamed live on www.epcrugby.com and on the official Heineken Champions Cup Facebook channel.

Saints earned a return to the top table of European rugby by virtue of their fourth-place finish in the Gallagher Premiership.

They could lock horns with the likes of PRO14 champions Leinster or recently-crowned French kings Toulouse.

Chris Boyd’s side will find themselves in either Tier 2 or Tier 3, depending on the results of a preliminary draw.

Clubs involved in the draw are...

Gallagher Premiership Rugby: Saracens (Tier 1), Exeter Chiefs, Gloucester Rugby (Tier 2), Saints, Harlequins (Tier 3), Bath Rugby (Tier 4), Sale Sharks (Tier 4)

Guinness PRO14: Leinster Rugby (Tier 1), Glasgow Warriors, Munster Rugby (Tier 2), Ulster Rugby, Connacht Rugby, Benetton Rugby (Tier 4), Ospreys (Tier 4)

TOP 14: Toulouse (Tier 1), ASM Clermont Auvergne, Lyon (Tier 2), La Rochelle, Racing 92 (Tier 3), Montpellier (Tier 4)

Key principles

– The 20 clubs are divided into four tiers based on their performances in the knockout phases of their leagues, and/or their qualifying positions from the leagues, or on other official qualification criteria. This will be done where necessary by a draw.

– The Heineken Champions Cup winner goes automatically into Tier 1

– The 20 clubs will then be drawn into five pools of four clubs each

– Each pool will have at least one club from each of the three leagues

– Each of the five pools will have one club from each of the four tiers

– There will be no more than two clubs from the same league in a pool

– No pool will contain two PRO14 clubs from the same country

– Clubs from the same league will be kept apart until the Tier 4 allocation

EPCR weekends

Round 1: November 15/16/17, 2019

Round 2: November 22/23/24, 2019

Round 3: December 6/7/8, 2019

Round 4: December 13/14/15, 2019

Round 5: January 10/11/12, 2020

Round 6: January 17/18/19, 2020

Quarter-finals: April 3/4/5, 2020

Semi-finals: May 1/2/3, 2020

Final: Saturday, May 23, 2020 (Marseille)