Neil Harris says he has already had enough of the pats on the back for Cardiff City as he strives to turn them into a long-term Premier League club. The Cardiff manager took the praise that came his way, and his players’, following their agonising 3-2 aggregate defeat to Fulham in their Championship semi-final. A 2-1 victory for the Bluebirds at Craven Cottage was not enough to overcome the damage done by a 2-0 home defeat in the first leg.

The FAW have ditched all uncompleted domestic cup competitions from the 2019/20 season, including the JD Welsh Cup. The Welsh Cup along with the FAW Women’s Cup, FAW Amateur Trophy, FAW Youth Cup, FAW U16 Girls’ Cup and the FAW Regions’ Cup had all been suspended following the coronavirus outbreak. Initially, it had been hoped that revised dates would be found to complete the competitions.

Competitive track and field athletics is set to return to Wales for the first time since the sport was locked down due to the coronavirus pandemic. Welsh Athletics has announced details of two pilot events which will take place in Aberdare and Swansea on the weekend of August 15 and 16.

When you’re an international 400m hurdler, the obstacles you face aren’t always of the two-foot-six inch variety. During a career plagued by serious injuries, Caryl Granville has been accustomed to overcoming adversity. But the Swansea Harrier is now facing possibly the biggest hurdle of not only her athletics career, but her life.

The New Saints will face Liverpool as part of their ongoing preparations for their UEFA Europa League qualifying campaign. The Cymru Premier runners-up have been back in pre-season training for three weeks ahead of their latest European campaign which is scheduled to begin on August 27 and will test their progress against the Premier League champions’ under-23 side. Along with facing the Merseyside club, Saints will also take in preparation games against fellow Welsh European qualifying clubs Bala Town and Barry Town, as well as fixtures with AFC Telford and Wolves under-23’s.

Neil Harris achieved a minor miracle at Elland Road earlier this season – but even that moral victory looks small beer compared to the real victory his Cardiff City team need tonight. Cardiff were 3-0 down at Leeds, got it back to 3-2, but then had Sean Morrison sent off before they eventually equalised to take a point from the team who became champions. Draws are no good to them at Fulham, this evening, however. Nor, even, a victory margin of one goal after their 2-0 home defeat in the first leg of their play-off semi-final.

Motorsport is finally emerging from the enforced pit stop of lockdown and for one Welshman the lights turn green again this weekend. Ryan Ratcliffe will be racing in the Porsche Carrera Cup at Donnington Park, keen to make up for lost time, as he tells Paul Evans. Racing is very much a family affair for Ryan Ratcliffe and the sport which has always been about spending weekends together as much as it has been about overtaking, has seen him win in some of the world’s most exotic cars. Despite never racing karts as a kid, which is the usual starting point for a would-be racing driver, Ratcliffe’s racing ancestry resembles a supercar showroom.

Steve Cooper will start a rebuilding job at Swansea City over the next few days after uncertainty over the club’s status next season was given brutal clarity by rampant Brentford. The Swans’ hopes of promotion back to the Premier League were ended with a 3-1 defeat in the second leg of their play-off semi-final – providing a 3-2 aggregate victory for the London club that sounds more anxious for the hosts than it really was. The defeat means Swansea will start a third season in the Championship since their relegation in 2018 and will receive the final and lowest instalment of their parachute payments.

Cardiff’s Maredudd Thomas has been trading verbal blows with opponent Sahir Iqbal ahead of their clash for the vacant WBC Youth Welterweight title next month. Iqbal was first with the punchline when he said he hadn’t heard much about Thomas, but did know that he was “superior in every aspect” to his Welsh opponent.

Matthew Stevens and Jamie Clarke have both been handed tough first-round assignments in the Betfred World Snooker Championships. Stevens, twice a finalist at the Crucible, takes on four-time champion John Higgins, runner-up to Judd Trump in 2019.

Andre Ayew has scored at World Cups, Africa Cups of Nations and in the Champions League, is the son of an African footballing legend, and came of age in the melting pot of the city of Marseille – but he can be a man of few words. Or, at least, a man of few topics – too modest, or perhaps, too focussed to divulge must of his past, according to his head coach at Swansea City, Steve Cooper. “Freddie Woodman sits down next to Andre every day for food at the training ground,” says Cooper.

How has the fastest Welsh women over half marathon and world record holder for Parkrun been managing during 2020? A year from the re-scheduled Olympics and exactly two years out from the next Commonwealth Games, Charlotte Arter tells training partner Jenny Nesbitt what she’s been up to and how she has managed to keep on track over the past four months. Having come off recording a stunning 70:00 at the 2020 Barcelona Half Marathon, Charlotte Arter was ready to take her fine form into a summer to remember. With the Olympics just around the corner and a chance at achieving one of the most renowned accolades in sport, it was all systems go on achieving the 31:25 qualifying standard for 10,000m.

Llanelli’s Jamie Clarke will make his Betfred World Championship debut this weekend after three stunning qualifying victories in Sheffield. Clarke – ranked 89 in the world – entered the fray at the English Institute of Sport in the second qualifying round, dispatching Birmingham’s Mitchell Mann 6-1, before creating the shock of the next round in defeating de facto top seed Joe Perry, 6-4. In the final qualifying round, Thailand’s Sunny Akani stood between Clarke and a place at the Crucible Theatre – and a new two-year tour card.

The Football Association of Wales have unveiled their rebranding for its new Tier 3 structure for Welsh football – but are already minus one club. The newly named ‘Ardal Leagues’ will launch next season, consisting of four regional divisions sitting below the JD Cymru North and JD Cymru South. Last season’s Nathaniel MG Cup runners-up STM Sports will not be among those competing after announcing they would be withdrawing from the league with immediate effect and will no longer be operational.

There will be no place for sentiment or emotion as far as Jake Bidwell is concerned when he bids for one final hurrah at Griffin Park on Wednesday night. The 27-year-old Swansea City defender may have made more than 200 appearances for The Bees in the past, but his sole focus this week will be on guiding the Swans to Wembley. Not even the fact it will be the final game for his former club at the ground that has been their home since 1906 will cause Bidwell a flicker of remorse if he can help his new club build on their one goal advantage from Sunday night’s home victory in the first leg of the Championship play-off semi-finals.

The Dragons are considering a move for Leicester contract rebel Greg Bateman to add to the incoming signing of Wales lock Will Rowlands. Rodney Parade director of rugby Dean Ryan has already signed Wales international backs Nick Tompkins and Jonah Holmes and Rowlands is soon to arrive from Wasps. Now, they are looking at Bateman who left Leicester earlier this month alongside England ace Manu Tuilagi after failing to agree a new deal at Welford Road.

Neil Harris has admitted Cardiff City are now an outside bet to reach a Wembley play-off final after claiming a combination of poor defending and poor decisions by the referee have handed Fulham a big advantage. A clearly frustrated Harris – seething over both the free-kick that cost his team a second goal in their 2-0 home defeat as well as ropey defensive play – insists the tie is still alive.But it would represent a huge turnaround at Craven Cottage on Thursday for the Bluebirds to reach the Championship play-off final.

Forget Ocean’s Eleven, the Welsh Pool 11 are back in the water. The leading swimmers in Wales have returned to training in Newport with their eyes firmly fixed on next year’s Olympic and Parlympic Games. Ross Nicholas tells Graham Thomas why a rest is even better than a change. Four months spent on dry land could turn out to be a blessing for Wales’ leading swimmers, according to the coach overseeing their return. The likes of Alys Thomas, Georgia Davies and Dan Jervis may have felt like fish out of water since March but national performance director Ross Nicholas believes there will be benefits to the curse of lockdown.

Junior Hoilett insists Cardiff City should hold no fear of Aleksandar Mitrovic – and it’s the Serbian warrior who should have been losing sleep. Mitrovic has been a recurring nightmare for most clubs in the regular Championship season and Fulham will look to the league’s top scorer to add to his 26 at Cardiff tonight in the first leg of their play-off contest. But Hoilett – who walked the detour to the Premier League via Wembley with QPR in 2014 – reckons it’s his own centre-backs, Sean Morrison and Curtis Nelson, who should be inducing the panic.

Rallying is fighting to avoid an complete Covid-19 induced wipe-out in 2020 – with just a few events still hoping to run this year.No rallying has taken place in Wales for five very long months. The lockdown handbrake was pulled so early in the season that only one forestry event – the Llandudno-based Visit Conwy Cambrian Rally – and only one road rally – the Rali Bro Caron, held on the lanes around Lampeter – took place before the sport screeched to a stop.