NEWPORT Gwent Dragons have been drawn alongside French side Brive, Aviva Premiership outfit Worcester and Russia’s Enisei-STM in Pool 3 of next season’s European Challenge Cup.

For Dragons chief Kingsley Jones, facing Enisei-STM will give him the chance to see some familiar faces from his time as the head coach of the Russian national team.

Enisei-STM made their Challenge Cup bow last term and recorded victories over Brive and Newcastle in the group stages.

Both of those games were played at the Yug Stadium in Sochi while their first fixture, a 31-14 defeat to Connacht, took place at their home ground in Siberia.

“The pool that we have been drawn into is a tough one, but we are confident that we will be able to progress through the initial stages,” said Jones.

“We want to make sure that we get as much as we can out of the pool stages this coming season.

“We are determined to go one better than we did last season and over the past two years we have shown our ambition and intent.”

He continued: “On a personal level it will be good to go back to Russia to see many old faces.

“I know a lot about this team having worked with them and I look forward to going back.”

The Dragons reached the semi-finals of the tournament last season before losing to Montpellier in the south of France.

The first round of European rugby fixtures will take place on the weekend of October 13/14/15/16 followed by round two a week later.

Round three takes place on December 8/9/10/11, with round four the following week before the final group games in January 2017.

Both the Challenge Cup and the Champions Cup finals will be played at Murrayfield on Friday, May 12 and Saturday, May 13 respectively.