IT'S a brave new world, a whole new ball game. Or is it?
When he was foreign secretary, Lord Palmerston was said to have dismissed a particularly arcane piece of politics involving the Schleswig-Holstein province by remarking that only three people had ever understood it: one was dead, one had gone mad thinking about it, and the other was Palmerston himself, who had forgotten all about it.
The start of the European Challenge Cup, when people are trying to work out what it is for, is the perfect time to recycle the joke. Only, you do have to wonder if there are as many as three people who have ever known what the tournament is for, although it is not hard to imagine one such individual going mad trying to find a point to the pointless.
After last season's turmoil almost tore European rugby apart, perhaps we should be be happy that there are tournaments for the leading teams to play in, but that does little to clear up the mystery of what teams gain from playing in a competition nobody cares about.
Under the old regime, it was a route to glory for some sides, a consolation prize for three clubs evicted from the Heineken Cup, while also being thoroughly worthwhile for all of them because the winner got something concrete: an automatic place in the following season's Heineken Cup.
It would have been so easy for the organisers of the brave new world of European rugby - controlled, as it is, by the English and French clubs - to have stuck with that arrangement. With six teams qualifying for the Heineken Cup from the English and French leagues and seven from the Guinness PRO12, they even had
a spot vacant and waiting for the Challenge Cup winner.
They were so determined, however, that the Challenge Cup had to be irrelevant, that they instead dreamt up a bizarre qualifying process for teams that finish in the bottom half of their leagues. Issues with logistics have forced one change already, and the arrangements will have to be altered again next season when the Rugby World Cup messes up the schedule.
This season whichever team goes on to win the final at the Twickenham Stoop at the start of May, will be handed a trophy will get to spray some fizzy, and probably alcoholic, drink around the place, and can then go on a lap of honour. Then they get back in the changing room and think: "Erm, is that it?" The answer: "Well, yes."
There is no television coverage worth talking about - just six of the first 40 games are broadcast in Britain and Ireland and to get them all you will need to pay TV subscriptions - and limited interest from the clubs, partly because some fixtures involve lengthy journeys well off the beaten track. Which is why Edinburgh found themselves having to get to the airport at 5am yesterday to arrive at Bordeaux almost 10 hours later hoping that no backs had stiffened up and no muscles had been tweaked as a consequence of the journey.
Facing them this evening will be a Bordeaux side who have demonstrated their commitment by making 11 changes from the team that hammered Castres last week, including the drafting in of three players from their Espoirs, effectively their academy side. Lucas Blanc, the wing, is in the starting XI alongside Marco Tauleigne, the lock, while Jean-Blaise Lespinasse, the back row, is on the bench. None of the players whose merits Alan Solomons, the Edinburgh head coach, had espoused before the trip make the match-day 23.
That may be a risk for either side, but French teams simply do not throw home matches and have the strength in depth to make sure they are putting out a side they expect to be good enough to win. Bordeaux also have some impressive firepower on the bench just in case.
Edinburgh would likely have preferred to make a similar raft of changes but, as Solomons pointed out, the capital side are not in a position to do so.
"We have two hookers available at the moment," said the Edinburgh coach. "There is not a lot of room for manoeuvre."
Given the chance, Solomons has, however, gone on to make a change at half-back but that is about the only position in which he has any flexibility. Since that involves Phil Burleigh being tried again at fly-half it also means he is out of options in the centre.
"This is a massive challenge for us," Solomons added. "They smashed Clermont-Auvergne and they smashed Castres, who were in the [Top14] finals last year. So at the moment they are riding high as one of the top teams in France."
It is a challenge not lost on the players either: "They're flying at the moment," said Tim Visser, the Edinburgh wing. "Look at any of the highlight packages coming out of France and all you see are ridiculous tries from Bordeaux. It shows the expansive rugby they're playing."
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