{"id":800315,"date":"2026-10-12T16:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-12T16:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/800315\/"},"modified":"2026-10-12T16:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-12T16:02:11","slug":"welsh-rugby-union-names-businessman-lyndon-faulkner-as-new-chair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/800315\/","title":{"rendered":"Welsh Rugby Union names businessman Lyndon Faulkner as new chair"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) has named former Newport and Ponytpool player Lyndon Faulkner as the governing body&#8217;s new chairman.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The 66-year-old is the nephew of legendary Wales and Pontypool prop Tony &#8220;Charlie&#8221; Faulkner and has become a successful businessman in the United States since his playing days.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Faulkner will take over the role <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/rugby-union\/articles\/cp84krx3yjxo\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">vacated by Richard Collier-Keywood<\/a> at the WRU&#8217;s annual general meeting on Sunday, 22 November.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He will do so at a time when the WRU is planning to cut the game&#8217;s professional tier from four to three teams, with west Wales sides Ospreys and Scarlets vying to avoid becoming surplus to requirements.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The WRU has already confirmed the team it owns, Cardiff, and privately-backed Dragons, will continue to exist beyond the 2027-28 season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The WRU described Faulkner&#8217;s appointment as &#8220;a major coup&#8221; and said he can &#8220;court the respect of both its community and professional game and the wider business world around it&#8221;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) has named former Newport and Ponytpool player Lyndon Faulkner as the governing body&#8217;s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":800316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-800315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=800315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/800316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=800315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=800315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=800315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}