{"id":557725,"date":"2026-03-22T21:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T21:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/557725\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T21:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T21:03:08","slug":"urc-wales-lifted-by-return-of-trio-as-south-african-sides-go-on-charge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/557725\/","title":{"rendered":"URC: Wales lifted by return of trio as South African sides go on charge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Flanker Alex Mann, number eight Aaron Wainwright and hooker Dewi Lake were leading lights for Wales in the Six Nations, but Tandy will welcome more competition.<\/p>\n

Morgan is arguably Wales’ only world-class player and the Lions forward showed his quality on Saturday.<\/p>\n

After being out since a dislocated left shoulder in November, the 26-year-old was straight into the fray off the bench for Ospreys at Benetton.<\/p>\n

Morgan produced a textbook jackal on his line to win a crucial breakdown penalty, although his efforts were not enough in a costly defeat.<\/a><\/p>\n

Italy boss Gonzalo Quesada watched on at Stadio Monigo and Tandy was no doubt keeping track back home.<\/p>\n

The Gloucester-bound flanker will be desperate to finish strongly at Ospreys before rejoining his country this summer.<\/p>\n

Faletau was named in Tandy’s first squad, but missed the autumn campaign with a knee injury, then suffered a calf issue ahead of the Six Nations.<\/p>\n

The 35-year-old returned with 24 minutes against Bulls on Friday and showed his class with some strong and rapid carries.<\/p>\n

Wainwright stepped up for Wales – and flankers Mann and James Botham were impressive alongside him – but Faletau remains a quality performer for Tandy to call on.<\/p>\n

Hooker Dee featured in all five Six Nations games in 2025, but suffered a shoulder injury on the opening weekend of the season.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old returned as a starter against Stormers and, after a typically feisty display, will have ambitions of battling Lake, Ryan Elias, Liam Belcher and clubmate Brodie Coghlan for action this summer.<\/p>\n

Dee established himself as a dependable sub under Warren Gatland, a role that frustrated him at the time, but one he would love to earn back.<\/p>\n

He will target of playing at a third World Cup after being involved in the 2019 and 2023 editions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Flanker Alex Mann, number eight Aaron Wainwright and hooker Dewi Lake were leading lights for Wales in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":557726,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-557725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=557725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557725\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/557726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=557725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=557725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=557725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}