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Josh Adams tackles the speculation he will fill No13 Wales shirt
By PA
Josh Adams says he would be “more than happy” to play his first Test match in the centre when Wales launch their Guinness Six Nations title defence on Saturday. The top try-scorer at the 2019 World Cup in Japan has won all of his 35 caps as a wing and scored 17 tries during an international career that also saw him selected for last summer’s British and Irish Lions tour to South Africa.
Wales head coach Wayne Pivac selected Adams in the No13 shirt against Autumn Nations Series opponents Fiji earlier this season, but he missed out through injury after the warm-up.
With George North, who excelled at outside centre during last season’s Six Nations campaign, continuing his recovery from a serious knee injury, it could be that Pivac again turns to Adams. “If that is where the coaches think I am best fitted for the team, that will be an exciting challenge for myself,” Adams said.
“I had a little cameo there against Toulouse a few weeks back with Cardiff. I enjoyed it. It was a different experience, maybe a few more touches of the ball, a bit more of a voice communicating-wise. Wherever I am needed, I will be more than happy. As long as I get to wear that red shirt, I am happy to play anywhere.”
Despite heading to Dublin as reigning Six Nations champions, Wales are only fourth favourites behind France, England and Ireland for a repeat achievement. They are also without a number of injured Lions, including North, Alun Wyn Jones, Leigh Halfpenny, Ken Owens, Justin Tipuric and Josh Navidi.
Adams added: “I don’t think many people expected us to win the championship (last year) did they? We are always the same as a group. We always try to keep ourselves tight, we have got confidence within the group and we work extremely hard, I can guarantee you that.
“Noticeably, my end anyway, the training intensity and the way that we have prepared this first week-and-a-half has been considerably better and more intense than what we were in the autumn.
“We have been no different to what we were doing in the autumn in some ways – obviously, small variations of course – but our intensity as a whole was a lot better. There are aspects where we probably let ourselves down a little bit in the autumn where we think we can be a lot more ruthless and efficient at, and those are the type of things we are trying to drill home at the minute.”
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Latest Comments
It is if he thinks he’s got hold of the ball and there is at least one other player between him and the ball carrier, which is why he has to reach around and over their heads. Not a deliberate action for me.
Go to commentsI understand, but England 30 years ago were a set piece focused kick heavy team not big on using backs.
Same as now.
South African sides from any period will have a big bunch of forwards smashing it up and a first five booting everything in their own half.
NZ until recently rarely if ever scrummed for penalties; the scrum is to attack from, broken play, not structured is what we’re after.
Same as now.
These are ways of playing very ingrained into the culture.
If you were in an English club team and were off to Fiji for a game against a club team you’d never heard of and had no footage of, how would you prepare?
For a forward dominated grind or would you assume they will throw the ball about because they are Fijian?
A Fiji way. An English way.
An Australian way depends on who you’ve scraped together that hasn’t been picked off by AFL or NRL, and that changes from generation to generation a lot of the time.
Actually, maybe that is their style. In fact, yes they have a style.
Nevermind. Fuggit I’ve typed it all out now.
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