Una Heineken Cup de grandes jugadores.

Este fin de semana, y parece que sin Teledeporte, tenemos los partidos de cuartos de final de la Heineken Cup, grandes equipos, grandes jugadores, emoción, rugby al cien por mil pero parece que en esta piel de toro lo vamos a tener que ver en internet o buscar algún pub inglés o irlandés.

The Heineken Cup is just getting better and better

A swift glance at the sheer quality of players in this weekend's Heineken Cup fixtures shows this season as special

Will this be a vintage Heineken Cup season? Despite – or maybe because of – the relative lack of English representation in the last eight, the answer is potentially yes. None of this year's quarter-finalists have fluked their way through to the knockout stages and you could stitch together a fantastic XV from those involved. Take, for example, the assorted midfields: Brian O'Driscoll, Yannick Jauzion, Mathieu Bastareaud, Jean de Villiers, Gordon D'Arcy and James Hook are all players either gifted or influential enough to grace any era.

Sometimes – and heaven knows it is easy to do – we forget how good some of these guys are. And, crucially, just how swiftly the game changes. Last week a panel of notables unveiled the shortlist for an ERC European Dream Team, drawn from players who have decorated the European club game in the past 15 years. It was a decent list (see below), as you would expect.

But what struck me looking down the candidates was the absence of virtually anyone under the age of 30. Barely a dozen of the 60 players mentioned will be involved this weekend. Could it be that the judges, who included Lawrence Dallaglio, Ieuan Evans, Fabien Galthié and Michael Lynagh, were swayed more by sepia-tinted memories of the great men they played and drank with, rather than the up-to-the-minute evidence of their own eyes? Or was the game – ahem – simply better back then?

Comparing eras is always hazardous. The panel are also justified in ranking flash-in-the-pan success beneath consistent achievement. But if this season's European rugby has proved anything it is that, breakdown interpretations aside, the pace, fitness and professionalism of the leading sides is superior to even three years ago.

Clermont Auvergne were quite outstanding at home to Leicester in December but, remarkably, sit only fourth in the Top 14 table. Leinster are proving doughty Heineken champions but failed to beat London Irish either home or away in the pool stages. The moral? Either the best modern sides are depressingly ordinary or standards right across the board are better than they have ever been. I tend towards the latter theory, which may be why today's leading lights do not always dazzle as obviously as some of their predecessors.

So perhaps it is time to stop harping on about how things ain't as good as they used to be. The future could be better still. It does not require much imagination to see Dan Biggar, Johnny Sexton, John Barclay, Danny Cipriani, Alex Goode and Billy Twelvetrees making a considerable impression on European audiences (albeit from afar in Cipriani's case) in the next two or three years. Maxime Mermoz, Sam Warburton, Tom Prydie and Tom Homer would all appear to have rosy career prospects.

Look out this weekend for Biggar, Sexton and Leinster's towering second-row Devin Toner. Wait and see how Ben Foden, Chris Ashton and Courtney Lawes fare at Thomond Park. Pick your likely semi-finalists (Clermont Auvergne, Munster, Ospreys and Toulouse, for me). And then ask yourself the question: if this is an ordinary European year, what on earth will a good one look like?

Shortlist for the ERC15 Dream Team XV (to be announced in May)

Full-backs Josh Lewsey, Geordan Murphy, Clément Poitrenaud, Tim Stimpson, Mark van Gisbergen

Wings Vincent Clerc, Cédric Heymans, Dafydd James, Josh Lewsey, Emile Ntamack

Centres Pat Howard, Yannick Jauzion, Christophe Lamaison, Brian O'Driscoll, Fraser Waters

Fly-halves Diego Domínguez, Austin Healey, David Humphreys, Stephen Jones, Ronan O'Gara

Scrum-halves Philippe Carbonneau, Jean-Baptiste Elissalde, Austin Healey, Rob Howley, Peter Stringer

Props Christian Califano, Pieter de Vililers, Peter Clohessy, Darren Garforth, John Hayes, Sylvain Marconnet, Jean-Baptiste Poux, Rodrigo Roncero, Graham Rowntree, Julian White

Hookers Jerry Flannery, Raphaël Ibañez, Mario Ledesma, William Servat, Keith Wood

Second rows Ben Kay, Martin Johnson, Paul O'Connell, Fabien Pelous, Simon Shaw

Flankers Neil Back, Jean Bouilhou, Martin Corry, Rocky Elsom, Greg Kacala, Olivier Magne, Alan Quinlan, David Wallace, Martyn Williams, Joe Worsley

No8s Lawrence Dallaglio, Anthony Foley, Jamie Heaslip, Christian Labit, Scott Quinnell

Continental drift

Those waiting for a raft of major "marquee" signings to join English clubs and replace the likes of the overseas-bound Carl Hayman and Danny Cipriani are advised not to hold their breath. "The days of big players coming in from outside and establishing the Premiership at the level it was at two years ago are probably gone now," suggested Sir Ian McGeechan last week. No kidding. It could be some time before the big-spending French clubs lose their current allure.

Under the influence

Modesty normally forbids but it is not often one is credited with overturning centuries of tradition. A small clutch of UK-based journos were chewing the cud – OK, drinking it – in a Limerick hotel on Good Friday evening when the manager told us our trip across the Irish Sea for the Magners League fixture between Munster and Leinster had been the clincher in persuading a local judge to open the city's bars in defiance of normal Easter custom. The local economy reportedly benefited by more then €7m (£6m). No wonder our cheery host Sean bought us all a pint.