The final of the 2024-25 edition of the Rugby Champions Cup will be held in Cardiff, Wales, where the first final of the competition was played in 1996, the organizer announced on Wednesday.
The match will take place at the Millennium, an iconic stadium in Cardiff city center that can accommodate up to 74,000 spectators.
The EPCR, the organizing body for the European Rugby Cups, made this choice after studying the candidacy of “23 stadiums across 12 countries”, it said in a press release.
The first continental final was held on January 6, 1996 at Arms Park, a stadium now adjacent to the Millenium, between the French from Stade Toulouse, first winners, and the Welsh from Cardiff.
In 2026 in Bilbao
“Returning to Cardiff thirty years after the first iconic final means a lot to us and our friends here in the city, and we will celebrate this milestone moment as it should be,” commented Dominic McKay, President of the EPCR, anticipating a “week -historic end” in “this land of rugby”.
The designated city also hosts each year the final of the European Challenge, the second continental competition, in addition to the Champions Cup.
Also read “It will be a funny match”: Toulouse – Racing, the round of 16 which is already making Europe dream
In 2024, the two finals will be played on May 24 and 25 at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in north London.
The 2025-2026 edition will conclude in the San Mames stadium (53,000 seats) in Bilbao in the Spanish Basque country, as in 2018, the EPCR also indicated.