Lawrence Dallaglio complained earlier this season that the Heineken Cup seeding system protected weaker teams in the tournament and ensured that the best eight sides in the tournament would not all find their way to the quarter-finals. Dallaglio's club, Wasps, went into the campaign as holders but found themselves in the same group as the previous champions, Munster. Two other previous winners this decade, Leicester and Toulouse, also found themselves paired together because of the system which kept apart the No1-rated team in each of the six participating countries.

That will change next season. The six seeds will be the sides with the best overall record in Europe going back four seasons based on a points system which, after giving teams between one and four points depending on where they finished in their pools, ranges from an extra one for reaching the quarter-finals to seven for winning the Heineken Cup. It means that Munster, Toulouse, Biarritz and Leicester will be kept apart in the groups next season.

Stade Français should make it five, but the sixth position is wide open. Ironically, it is currently held by Wasps, but Gloucester and Perpignan can overtake them, while Saracens and the Ospreys, who meet at Vicarage Road in the quarter-finals on Sunday, can catch Wasps on 18 merit points. To do so, they would have to win the Heineken Cup and the holders will be given the top seeding irrespective of their form over the previous four seasons. So to be seeded, Wasps need Toulouse or Munster to win the trophy and Gloucester and Perpignan to fall before the final. Otherwise the club may find itself involved again with Munster, assuming Wasps qualify for next season's Heineken Cup.

The whole of the pool draw will be layered with the top six seeds kept apart, then the next six and so on. It should minimise the sometimes wide disparity in the quality of pools. Three seasons ago, Cardiff Blues, Leeds, Calvisano and Perpignan made up a relatively weak pool, while Leicester, Stade Français, the Ospreys and Clermont Auvergne made up another foursome.

A problem with changing the seeding is that the quarter-finalists will not vary much from year to year. This season, London Irish, Saracens, the Ospreys and Cardiff Blues have qualified for the last eight for the first time (Cardiff did so when Wales operated a club system), whereas Gloucester had not reached the last eight for seven years.

It's not quite like the FA Cup this year, with only one Premier League club making the last four, but Wasps, Leicester and Stade Français failed to survive the pool stage, following Toulouse the previous season. So while England have three home quarter-finalists, only Gloucester have headed the Premiership this season.

Saracens and London Irish were the top two seeds after the pool stage, but was that a reflection of their strength or the pools they were in? In each of the three previous Heineken Cup campaigns, one of the teams which qualified as one of the two best runners-up went on to make the semi-finals despite having the handicap of an away tie. It has often been better for a team which has an away quarter-final tie to have qualified as one of the best runners-up rather than travel to a side which has emerged at the head of a tough pool. The only side which has been the highest-ranked team after the pool stage that has gone on to win the trophy was Toulouse back in the inaugural season of the competition in 1995-96.

So if the Heineken Cup is about maximising the chances of finding the truly best side in Europe, the change in the seeding system is necessary. But because it is, in essence, a hybrid tournament, combining a league element with a knock-out stage, luck of the draw will always be a factor.

It is the same in the World Cup. South Africa won the tournament in France last year without having to play New Zealand, Australia or France. They could call themselves the world champions, but did it mean they were the best team in the world? When Wales returned from the 1987 World Cup having won the play-off, they described themselves as the third-best team in the world, but they were merely third in the World Cup; there was a difference.

The Heineken Cup replicates the World Cup in a way the Super 14 series does not. It helped France and England last year, but South Africa, who had provided the two Super 14 finalists earlier in the year, did not. It is as much about who you avoid meeting as who you beat along the way.