Premiership kings ready to retain their crown

PRINCIPALITY Welsh Premiership champions Pontypridd are busy preparing for the defence of their crown with changes on and off the field at Sardis Road.

Fly-half Dai Flanagan has been the big signing of the summer so far while Pontypridd will lose the services of Rhys Downes next term after the scrum-half was released by Cardiff Blues.

It has also been confirmed that experienced former Wales international Gareth Wyatt will take on some of the coaching duties when Paul John is away with the country’s Sevens team.

He will continue to turn out for the club alongside Thomas Pascoe (centre), Lewis Jones (scrum-half), Darran Harris (hooker), Jack Dando (hooker) and Cory Hill (lock) who are Pontypridd’s allocation of Blues Academy players for next season.

All bar Mountain Ash product Pascoe played for the club last season as Pontypridd finished top of the table before going on to beat Llanelli in the Premiership play-off grand final.

“We are again grateful to the Blues for their co-operation, and we will make the most of this opportunity to help develop local talent to progress to fully professional status,” said head coach Dale McIntosh.

“We feel that Pontypridd is a formidable club, and a good environment to nurture these youngsters both as players and as people.

“We are delighted to have Lewis, Cory, Darran and Jack back with us, and welcome Tom Pascoe on board. He is a player full of potential who has had his progress disrupted by injury over the past two seasons, but will now offer us an exciting option in midfield.

“These are all local boys who have a great pedigree and will benefit from being given game time in the black and white of Pontypridd.”

The close season is also giving injured players the chance to get back to full fitness, or in the case of back row forward Owen Sheppeard and centre Dafydd Lockyer, time to go under the knife.

Both will have surgery early next month on knee ligament damage and a shoulder problem respectively before they begin a period of rehabilitation which is likely to see them miss the start of the new campaign.

However, the likes of winger Owen Williams and outside-half Simon Humberstone (both knee ligament damage) and hooker Jack Dando (dislocated shoulder) are expected to be fit for the big kick-off.

Meanwhile, Louie Tonkin has replaced Neil Burns as Llanelli’s new conditioning coach following the latter’s promotion to the Scarlets.

“We were delighted to see ‘Burnsy’ getting promoted up to the Scarlets environment and, of course, welcome Louie on his development pathway,” said head of rugby Anthony Buchanan. “We are all about feeding the Scarlets, not only players, but coaches and physios and we all hope that Louie takes his opportunity and enjoys the experience.”

While Tonkin joins the club from Carmarthen Athletic, Pontyberem product and former player Alec Jenkins has re-joined the squad, which will again be captained by Adam Powell next season.