Cardiff City and Swansea City should both limit their spending on wages to 70 per cent of their revenue if they want to survive, say financial services firm Deloitte. A salary cap at will be crucial to the viability of Championship clubs affected by the coronavirus pandemic, claim the football finance specialists. Both Cardiff and Swansea are preparing for the resumption of matches next weekend after three months without any match day revenue.

For Welsh fans, the return of rugby in New Zealand this weekend has an added attraction – Warren Gatland. The former Wales coach will be in charge at the Chiefs, where Gareth Anscombe believes the “Gats Factor” is already having an effect, as he told Graham Thomas. Gareth Anscombe believes Warren Gatland is already improving New Zealand rugby – thanks to his tried and trusted coaching methods with Wales. Both New Zealanders will be absorbed in the return of rugby this weekend, when Super Rugby Aotearoa kicks-off in their homeland which is now free of coronavirus.

Rugby is back this weekend. At least, in New Zealand it is. The newly constructed Super Rugby Aotearoa kicks off on Saturday with a twist – orange cards. Not red, not yellow, but something in between – a pale, washed-out shade of orange. It’s got Peter Jackson seeing red. As from this weekend, referees in New Zealand will be empowered to use a new card, a soft red as in soft on law and order. The red cards they carry into rugby’s first high-level matches since Scotland beat France more than three months ago will be a diluted version of the real thing, a red-lite which will be condemned by many as undermining the ultimate sanction.

They may not carry quite the recognition factor of Cardiff City, Swansea City or Wrexham, but Brickfield Rangers FC just might be Wales’ biggest football club. They run 27 teams and have over 500 players, but it’s only by tapping into public funds have they been able to survive the current shutdown as Graham Thomas reports. Robbie Savage cut his teeth – but not his hair – playing for Brickfield Rangers and now, thanks to emergency funding, others may continue to follow in his footsteps. The former Wales midfielder, now a regular TV and radio pundit, played for the Wrexham-based club as a young kid back in the 1980s.

Wales Rally GB bit the dust this week as the latest sporting event to be shelved due the coronavirus pandemic. Infection rates may be falling, but until sport more generally is able to adapt to the realities imposed by social distancing, then the disappointment for fans will continue, as Paul Evans considers. There is nothing like a global pandemic to make you appreciate what you have – or had. Visiting loved ones, caring what day it is, driving for more than five miles just for the hell of it – simple pleasures that we took for granted.

Nia Jones has an instant solution to whenever the lockdown blues threaten to bring her down – she gets her kit on. The Wales netball captain has admitted she can find motivation a tricky problem when training alone during lockdown. Like the rest of the Worcester-based Severn Stars squad, Jones is following routines sent to her online or as part of an active Zoom session where the players listen in remotely to the coaches while going through their paces.

Sol Bamba insists Cardiff City can get on a roll that can take them to the Premier League if they can beat Leeds United when the Championship season resumes next week. The Bluebirds defender – whose club are due to play a training match against Swansea City on Saturday – still believes his team can make the promotion play-offs. Seeking a return to the Premier League after an absence of more than 16 years, Leeds sit top of the Championship ahead of the restart, and travel to Cardiff for a midday kick-off on Sunday, June 21, live on Sky Sports.

He’s only gone and done it again! Back in 2007, Phil Bennett’s marvellous try against Scotland at Murrayfield won the BBC Wales vote for the best Welsh try in the Five or Six Nations and now it has come out on top once more in the Welsh Rugby Union’s ‘Greatest Ever Welsh Try’ competition. The Llanelli outside-half featured twice in a try that began at a breakdown in the Welsh 22 and ended up with what Bill McLaren described in commentary as “the try of the Championship”. More than that, it clinched another Triple Crown.

Ironman Wales competitors are to be offered the chance to roll their race registrations over to 2021 after the cancellation of this year’s event. Race organisers are sending emails to tri-athletes which will offer to move their £475 entries on to next year’s event after this September’s big day was called off due to the coronavirus pandemic. More than 2,000 athletes from all over the world were due to take part in the sold out event on 6 September, with thousands of spectators gathering in Tenby and along the route.

Newport County plan to inform fans this week about refunds for this season after Leagues One and Two were brought to a premature end. The club have issued a statement saying they will soon reveal intentions for dealing with season ticket holders for the current 2019-20 season as well as those who have bought individual match tickets. They will also update on details over which players are being retained for next season as well as plans for a new kit supplier for the new campaign, which may not begin until September and is still likely to involve no fans.

Wales Rally GB has been cancelled for the first time in over 40 years. The event – due to take place at the end of October and the high point of the sport in Wales – has been shelved due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic The Deeside-based rally has become the third round of the World Rally Championship in less than a week to be cancelled and casts major doubts over the viability of this season’s championship. Last Wednesday Rally Finland suffered the same fate followed 24 hours later by Rally New Zealand.

Next year’s British and Irish Lions tour to South Africa could now be moved back to the autumn, the hosts have conceded. The acceptance comes as countries around the world try to put together a revised playing schedule that proves workable in the wake of the current shutdown for the sport. While football plans to resume in the UK next week – albeit behind closed doors – rugby only has tentative dates in place for a resumption in August and the knock-on effects for both the Test and domestic game of five months of inactivity are going to be huge.

Newly appointed Haverfordwest chairman Rob Edwards has outlined his ambitious plans for the club and wants to transform them into European contenders in three years. Edwards, who recently replaced David Hughes as chairman of the Pembrokeshire side, told Leyton Orient podcast ‘The LO Down’ that a sustained growth period can take the club back into Europe for the first time since 2004. “It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that next season, if we’re a [Cymru] Premier League club we can consolidate,” Edwards said.

Welsh rugby fans can get an immediate look at how Warren Gatland gets on when Super Rugby returns to New Zealand this weekend. The former Wales coach will be sending his Chiefs team out to meet the Highlanders on Saturday in the new Super Rugby Aotearoa tournament. With crowds allowed in after New Zealand declared it was free of new cases of coronavirus, there is the possibility of sold-out grandstands when the Highlanders host the Chiefs in Dunedin on Saturday and the Blues face the Hurricanes at Eden Park on Sunday in the first round.

Cardiff City’s Championship clash at home to Leeds United will spearhead the opening weekend of matches to be shown live on TV when the campaign resumes next week. The Bluebirds’ fixture against the leaders will be screened live on Sky Sports on Sunday June 21 at 12.00 as the season starts again behind closed doors. Swansea City’s first match since the season was halted in March will be the day before Cardiff’s – a match not televised live at Middlesbrough on Saturday June 20 at 3.00pm.

Former Wales U20 cap and Cardiff Met skipper Aled Ward has opted to join English Championship side Hartpury University RFC next season. Ward was in the Cardiff Met side that played Hartpury University in the 2018 BUCS Super Rugby play-off final at Twickenham in 2018 and has been capped at U18 and U20 level. He also spent a year in the Cardiff Blues academy.

Former Cardiff City striker Gary Stevens has announced he is stepping down as manager of English non-league club Wellington after three seasons in charge. The 65-year-old former boss at Knighton Town, who insists he is not yet ready to walk away from football, was a crowd-favourite at Cardiff as Terry Phillips recalls. Gary Stevens, the Bluebirds’ very own ‘Basil Fawlty’, worked as a chicken factory worker when Cardiff City manager Richie Morgan signed the striker from non-League Evesham in 1978. Stevens was tall, dark-haired and had a moustache. He was quickly nicknamed ‘Basil’ by supporters after the John Cleese character in the hit TV comedy, Fawlty Towers.

Ashton Hewitt has thanked those who have supported his backing for the Black Lives matter campaign and the revelations over his own experiences of racism in Wales. The Dragons wing – who was called up to train with Wales during this season’s Six Nations – gave a revealing account of his encounters with police as a black rugby player. His interview with the South Wales Argus and other media led to a huge reaction and also provoked debate with fellow former Dragons star Andrew Coombs, who accused protestors in London of violence towards the police.

Robert Jones cherishes each one of his 54 Wales and three British and Irish Lions caps. But the proud son of Trebanos says that Swansea’s 1992 triumph over then World Cup holders Australia means more to him than his victories in a red jersey. The scrum-half played 286 times for the Whites between 1983 and 2002, and was wearing the No.9 shirt when the Wallabies paid a visit to St Helen’s on 4 November 1992. The match will be re-lived on S4C’s Clwb Rygbi, at 6.15pm on Saturday 6 June, and will also be available to watch on S4C Clic and BBC iPlayer after broadcast.

Elite sport is slowly returning. Some, like professional football, are preparing to resume competition, but for most it’s about small steps to resume training. But while some sports get on to their starting blocks, others are still waiting outside the stadium – and there is also a difference between Wales and England, as Sport Wales CEO Brian Davies tells Graham Thomas. Sport Wales acting chief executive Brian Davies insists the country’s top athletes will not get left behind their rivals in the race to be ready again for major competitions. Welsh elite athletes in all sports are still waiting for a green light to resume training as some of the lockdown restrictions start to ease across other parts of the UK.