Scarlets face stiff task to retain Academy U18 championship title

Wales U18 head coach Richie Pugh is facing a busy few weeks with the re-styled Academy U18 tournament about to kick off. The first round of fixtures takes place on Sunday 12 January and over the course of seven successive weekends the champions will emerge. Scarlets are the holders of the title and they sit […]

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Scarlets face stiff task to retain Regional Age Grade title

Wales U18 head coach Richie Pugh is facing a busy few weeks with the re-styled Regional Age Grade U18 tournament about to kick off. The first round of fixtures takes place on Sunday 12 January and over the course of seven successive weekends the champions will emerge. Scarlets are the holders of the title and […]

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Thunder slip to defeat against reigning champions

Brython Thunder are still looking for their first win after going down 48-0 to reigning champions, Wolfhounds, in Round 4 of the Celtic Challenge at Parc y Scarlets this afternoon. The Wolfhounds were crowned league champions and were unbeaten in last season’s new cross-border competition between sides from Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The Thunder came […]

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Emanuel (Ioan not Steff!) double steers Wales U20 to impressive win

The Welsh Academies U23 XV promised to give the Wales U20 side a run for their money in the first of two clashes ahead of the U20 Six Nations and they did exactly that at the Arms Park. In front of a very healthy crowd, Richard Whiffin’s U20 team were forced to tough it out […]

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Phillips ready to test Wales U20 and push own credentials

Wales U20 will get some vital pre-Six Nations preparation this week and next when they meet the newly formed Welsh Academies U23 XV, but the games at Cardiff Arms Park (Friday 10 January) and Llandovery’s Church Bank (Friday 17 January) won’t just be about them. The way the fixtures have been set-up, and the way […]

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Europe is testing ground as Borthwick looks for Six Nations winning blend

With Alex Mitchell back at scrum-half, England could turn opener in Dublin into start of successful campaign

Maybe Elon Musk is the man to revive English rugby union. He already believes he has the solutions to most of the universe’s biggest problems so reforming a mere sports team should be a piece of futuristic cake. Throw £40bn at it, take over the comms department and stick the Rugby Football Union’s finest on a rocket ship to Mars? It’s an easy game, megalomania.

Back in the real world, of course, nothing is ever quite that straightforward. Even AI cannot identify why England keep struggling to maximise their resources because there is no one simple explanation. As Steve Borthwick prepares to unveil his Six Nations squad on Tuesday, it is again less about the individuals per se than finding the right blend to enable the collective to flourish.

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Japanese Ambassador visits Principality Stadium to celebrate ‘Wales and Japan 2025’

The Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) hosted His Excellency, the Japanese Ambassador to the United Kingdom, at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium earlier this week (Wednesday). The visit marks the beginning of a series of cultural and sporting events in celebration of ‘Wales and Japan 2025’, highlighting the strong ties between the two countries. The partnership between Wales […]

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Stuart Hogg was a world class Scottish rugby player who now has to relocate his moral compass | Robert Kitson

The former national rugby union captain has been spared jail for the domestic abuse of his estranged wife, Gill, after courts painted a grim picture of his off-pitch behaviour

Scotland has not always been blessed with rugby players of genuine world class but prime-time Stuart Hogg was a rare exception. At the height of his powers he was the Six Nations Player of the Year in successive seasons in 2016 and 2017, mixing acceleration and attacking intent with a just-try-and-stop-me attitude that set him apart from the average workaday pro.

The talented lad from Hawick was a big fish in a series of smallish pools – the Borders, Scottish rugby, Exeter – and grew accustomed to being hailed as king of his local oval-ball castle. While, behind closed doors, not being entirely the man his many fans thought him to be.

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Lewis targeting two wins for Welsh Academies XV

Scarlets scrum half Rhodri Lewis says his Welsh Academies U23 XV will go into their two clashes with Wales U20 “quietly confident” of not only testing them, but also emerging with a couple of wins.   This time last year Lewis was in the ‘other camp’ preparing for the World Rugby U20 Junior Championship in […]

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Former Scotland rugby union captain Stuart Hogg sentenced after admitting domestic abuse

  • Hogg given community payback order with supervision
  • Sentence for 32-year-old is an ‘alternative to custody’

The former Scotland rugby union captain Stuart Hogg will be supervised for a year as an alternative to jail after he admitted abusing his estranged wife over the course of five years.

He pleaded guilty to a single charge of domestic abuse of his ex-partner, Gillian Hogg, when he appeared at Selkirk Sheriff Court on 4 November. He admitted shouting and swearing, tracking her movements and sending her messages which were alarming and distressing in nature.

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McBryde edges Lloyd out of top spot as leading SRC points scorer

It’s a New Year and all change at the top of the try and points scoring charts of Super Rygbi Cymru. Cardiff winger Dewi Cross has been deposed as the leading try scorer with Ebbw Vale’s captain Joe Franchi leaping to the top of the pile after scoring against Pontypool just before the New Year. […]

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