Here are the latest rugby headlines on Saturday, March 30.
Rees-Zammit information thrills household and team-mates
Louis Rees-Zammit’s household, mates and former rugby team-mates have been blown away by his success in touchdown an NFL cope with the Kansas City Chiefs.
News of the three-year contract with the Super Bowl champions has triggered a stir on each side of the Atlantic. The Welshman was joined by his dad and mom and brother, Taylor, as he signed the deal within the US, with Taylor saying: “We’re all so proud.”
There have been plaudits for Rees-Zammit from quite a lot of different locations. Sam Warburton wrote in his Times column: “He is a visionary and is ready to take dangers and I actually admire that. The simple choice would have been to remain in rugby and to signal for somebody like Racing 92 in France, as a result of he was attracting some severe presents from there and Japan, however he has backed himself. I really like his confidence and also you want that to be a top-level participant in any sport.”
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Many different rugby stars from world wide have been fast to congratulate the Welshman, together with England legend Lawrence Dallaglio who instructed Rees-Zammit he was “loving your work”. Current gamers corresponding to Liam Williams, Gareth Anscombe and Gareth Davies have been all thrilled for his or her former team-mate on social media.
NFL Academy head coach Steve Hagen, who has been an enormous a part of Rees-Zammit’s coaching over the previous few weeks, mentioned: “Congratulations Louis, you took an opportunity on your self and also you made it work. I simply really feel blessed that I had the possibility that can assist you out somewhat bit.”
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Ospreys offers
The Ospreys have signed Munster hooker Chris Moore on mortgage from Munster.
Moore has joined the crew on a short-term foundation as damage cowl. The 23-year-old hails from Trowbridge, England, and has beforehand represented Ireland at u18 stage.
Toby Booth’s aspect have additionally given a brand new contract to hooker Ethan Lewis. “I’m completely satisfied to have the ability to proceed my profession with the Ospreys,” mentioned Lewis.
“I’ve loved my time right here up to now and the boys have all made me really feel welcome since I joined. I’m trying ahead to seeing what we will do as a crew this season.”
The 30-year-old has beforehand performed for Cardiff and Saracens however joined the Ospreys final summer time. “Ethan has been a welcome addition to the squad since he joined,” mentioned Ospreys head coach Toby Booth.
“It’s vitally essential to have energy in depth on the hooker position, largely as a consequence of its specialised nature. With Ethan, Dewi [Lake], Sam [Parry] and Lewis [Lloyd] all with us subsequent season, we really feel we’re in an excellent place in that division.”
Cardiff announce monetary losses of £2.1m
Cardiff have introduced a monetary lack of £2.1m for the yr ending 2023 which is a lower in deficit from £2.2m on the earlier yr.
This comes off the again of the Ospreys asserting losses of greater than £2m whereas the Scarlets posted almost £3m price of losses. In their report, Cardiff state they “returned to the old days of disaster administration, managing collectors and delayed funds”.
They additionally declare the “lack of progress” over signing the six-year monetary framework with the Welsh Rugby Union “placed an unlimited pressure on the corporate and its govt crew”. Cardiff added: “This scenario continued nicely into 2023 and the discount in funding and have to reset the market, which had turn out to be over inflated, led various excessive profile gamers to depart from the membership on the finish of the 2022-23 season.”
All 4 areas are paying again a £20m mortgage to the Welsh Government, now £13m, at an rate of interest of 8.25%. Cardiff’s possession modified palms after the unhappy demise of former chairman Peter Thomas with Helford Capital finishing a takeover in January.
Cardiff obtained £8.8m from the WRU through the yr ending June 2023 whereas they elevated their turnover from £16.1m from £13.2m. The business’ working losses have been all the way down to £1.9m from £2.1m.
The area’s matchday earnings fell barely and earnings from sponsorship elevated from £1m to £1.2m whereas hospitality and catering earnings rose from £1.3m to £1.5m.
Jon Davies: Wales should put marker down in Australia
Jonathan Davies says Wales should put a marker down after they go on a summer time tour of Australia in July.
The legendary centre, who presently performs for Scarlets, spoke to Six Nations Rugby concerning the recent event, the place Wales picked up their first picket spoon in 21 years.
‘Foxy’ was requested whether or not we started to see the blueprint for the way forward for Welsh rugby, and the previous Clermont man defined that there have been positives, however Wales should not depend on the “creating squad” tag that has turn out to be so synonymous with the crew.
“It’s most likely too quickly to say,” defined Davies.
“We talked firstly of the Championship about Wales discovering their id and what they need to turn out to be, and I don’t really feel they know fairly during which route they need to go. That will take time, however what’s a optimistic is that a variety of young gamers have been uncovered to the highest stage and seen what’s required to be top-of-the-line groups.
“So for me, it’s about studying from that now, and never resting on the ‘this is a young team in development’ line. They need to push on and put a marker down on this summer time tour as a result of it’s essential that they don’t have this confidence drain over a chronic time frame.
“I keep in mind in 2012 after we went on a lack of eight or 9 video games. It was robust going. However, we have been lucky that our crew had expertise of profitable as nicely, so it’s going to be attention-grabbing to see the place issues go together with this Welsh crew.”
