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Wales call in scrum-half last capped in 2016 due to Webb fitness concern
By PA
Wales face an anxious wait over the fitness of scrum-half Rhys Webb ahead of Saturday’s Guinness Six Nations game against Scotland. Webb suffered a bang to the knee during Wales’ 38-21 defeat against France in Paris last weekend.
Cardiff scrum-half Lloyd Williams, who won the last of his 28 caps four years ago against Japan, has been called up to the Wales squad as cover.
If Webb is ruled out of the Scotland encounter, then Scarlets number nine Gareth Davies would be in pole position to start, while Wales also have uncapped Kieran Hardy among their ranks.
Wales assistant coach Stephen Jones said: “Hopefully it’s not too serious, is the answer to Rhys. We are assessing him on a daily basis. We know Lloyd is an experienced scrum-half with a very good, balanced game.
"He’s a very smart rugby player, so we know he can pick up our game-plan very quickly. He (Webb) has had his bump to the knee, and we will be guided by the medical guys on this. It’s a waiting game, but we will find out from them.”
While Wales continue to monitor Webb, his fellow back Liam Williams could be in the selection mix. Williams, who suffered an injury during the World Cup last year and has had extremely limited game-time since then, featured for the Scarlets in their Guinness PRO14 victory over Benetton last Friday.
Jones added: “With Liam, we all know what a talented player he is. “It was very important he got some game-time. Obviously, we would have liked him to have had more ball in hand in that game against Benetton, but he came through the game unscathed. He has had a good couple of weeks with us as well in training, so that has been positive for us.”
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Latest Comments
I think you have gone in the wrong direction here Nick. I think you need to delve down into the rules etc around Moana Pacifica’s selection policies and then you need to understand that a lot of KIWI BORN rugby players have PI heritage. It appears ok for the 4 home nations to pillage NZ born players constantly without retribution but you want to question whether NZ BORN players should be eligible for NZ? Seems a real agenda in there.
Go back and look at the actual Aims and agenda for MP becoming a entity and you see lots of things enshrined in policy that you arnt mentioning here. EG there is an allowance for a percentage of MP to be NZ eligible. This was done so MP could actually become competitive. Lets be real. If it wasnt this way then MP would not be competitive.
There also seems to be some sort of claim ( mainly from the NH ) that NZ is “cashing in” on MP, which , quite frankly is a major error. Are you aware of how much MP costs NZR Financially?
39 NZ born rugby players played at the last world cup for Samoa or Tonga. PLUS plenty for Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales.
Taumoefolau is a BORN AND BRED NZer. However I very strongly doubt he will be an AB, but who do you believe he should be allowed to play for? Levi Aumua is ALSO a born and bred Kiwi.
Aumua was eligible to represent Samoa and Fiji for the Pacific Nations Cup in July that year but ended up playing for neither. He IS eligible for his nation of Birth too Nick
He is a Kiwi. Are you saying an NZ born, raised Kiwi cant play for NZ now?
Sorry Nick Kiwi born and bred actually qualify for NZ.
Go to commentsYeah, Richie certainly stepped up for the ABs in 2022 and 2023 and proved he could translate his skills into the test arena. You have to understand many fans checked out at that point though, only to tune back in for a directionless WC final.
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