Welsh Fire have extended their deal with Jimmy Neesham after suffering a double blow over that will deny them of both Lungi Ngidi and Liam Plunkett for the remainder of their Hundred campaign. South African Ngidi, 25, has returned home for personal reasons without having played a game, while former England bowler Plukett has been ruled out through injury. That has forced a re-think for the Fire – and for Neesham – with the New Zealand all-rounder now extending his deal for the rest of the inaugural tournament.

By Alex Bywater West Indies run machine Hayley Matthews urged her Welsh Fire women’s side not to rest on their laurels after sealing a first win in The Hundred on Saturday afternoon, the Fire will now be looking to claim back to back wins when they take on the Oval Invicibles later today (Monday). Matthews is the second top run scorer in the women’s competition with 134 runs from her three matches so far and her unbeaten 71 helped Welsh Fire to a convincing nine-wicket success over Manchester Originals at Sophia Gardens on Saturday.

Leus du Plooy has vowed that Welsh Fire will re-ignite their campaign quickly on Monday after suffering their first defeat in The Hundred. The South African smashed a blazing 22-ball 43 which featured four sixes in what was ultimately a losing effort for Fire at home to Manchester Originals. A win on Saturday would have moved Fire up to first place in the table and well on their way to qualifying for the knockout stages of the tournament. Now, they must ensure winning momentum is not reversed when they meet Oval Invincilbes in south London on Monday.

Dan Jervis finished fifth in his first Olympic final as Great Britain ended their most successful swimming campaign in Games history. Swansea swimmer Jervis dug in for a gritty performance that ended with him finishing outside the medals, with a time of 14:55.48 that was some way short of his personal best as well as the 14:48.67 that earned him a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games in 2018. But the 25-year-old Swim Wales athlete from Resolven should feel proud and encouraged by placing so near to medals at his maiden Olympic Games.

Lauren Price insists she holds no fears about facing old foe Nouchka Fontijn in a shoot-out for an Olympic final. The Welsh boxer has her sights set on a gold medal after guaranteeing herself at least a bronze for Great Britain with a quarter-final victory in Tokyo. Price, the world champion from Ystrad Mynach, will face Fontijn in the semi-finals after beating Panama’s Atheyna Bylon, 5-0, on Saturday.

Welsh Fire are blazing. The men’s team have played twice and won twice and sit second of the eight teams in the early table. It’s not quite ignited yet for Welsh Fire women, who have lost both opening fixtures, but approval ratings for The Hundred generally have been high. Fraser Watson is a hard man to please, but even he thinks something significant is going on in the old sport. After 86 balls of the run chase, with the Southern Braves still needing 29 to win a pulsating contest, Chris Jordan shaped up to put Jimmy Neesham into the stands. He contrived only to slice it to Josh Cobb at extra cover – a catch which essentially secured a second straight Welsh Fire win.

Dan Jervis won’t be alone when he prays ahead of his Olympic debut in the 1500 metres freestyle event in Tokyo on Friday. Back in Neath, the congregation of Sardis Baptist Church have been on their knees for weeks hoping to invoke some divine intervention for one of their flock. Pastor Fortunato Santos has put Dan at the heart of his prayer chain in a bid to help him bring back some gold from Japan.

Welsh rowers Oliver Wynne-Griffith and Josh Bugajski took a bronze medal in the men’s eight but there was another GB rowing near miss for Vicky Thornley in Tokyo – before Bugajski launched a furious attack on the sport’s former head coach. Wynne-Griffith and Bugajski were part of the men’s eight crew that battled to a third place finish behind Germany, who took silver, and new Olympic champions New Zealand. Thornley agonisingly missed out on a medal in the women’s single sculls after finishing fourth in her final – the sixth fourth-placed finish for Great Britain this week.

Vicky Thornley is on course for a shot at another Olympic medal and is desperate to break the sequence of agonizing fourth place finishes for Team GB. The Welsh rower became just the third British female single sculler to reach an Olympic final – and the first for 25 years – after finishing second in her semi-final. Now, Thornley – who won a silver medal in the women’s double sculls with Dame Katherine Grainger at the Rio Games in 2016 – has her sights on a first ever British medal in women’s single sculls in the final on Friday morning.

By Paul Jones Welsh judo star Natalie Powell suffered Second Round heartbreak in her quest to claim a first Olympic medal in Tokyo. The Builth Wells athlete who has previously been a World, European and Commonwealth medalist received a bye in the opening round of the -78kg competition and faced a wait to find out her Second Round opponent. Korea’s World No.23 Hyunji Yoon defeated USA’s Nefeli Papadakis on the day for the right to face Powell for a place in the last 16.

By Owen Morgan Jake Heyward and Joe Brier aren’t the only Welshmen hoping to make an impact when the athletics programme begins at the Tokyo Olympics this Friday. Swansea Harrier Brier is part of the Great Britain 4×400 squad in Japan, while Cardiff’s Heyward will be lining up in the 1500m. But there is an even greater Welsh contingent playing its part off the track in the Far East by making up half of the 12 lead coaches supporting GB’s athletics team.

Alys Thomas delivered her fastest time of the year to place seventh in a rapid women’s 200m butterfly Olympic final in Tokyo. The Swim Wales and Swansea Aquatics competitor, making her Olympic debut aged 30, moved things on from her semi-final efforts in emphatic style, knocking more than a second off that time in a contest that saw China’s Zhang Yufei break the Games record to take gold. While the 2018 Commonwealth Games champion did not finish on the podium, there was still plenty of positives for Thomas to reflect on at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre.

By Alex Bywater  Jonny Bairstow signed off from Welsh Fire duty with a second match-winning knock and his team-mates are confident they can cope without the England star. Fire’s men’s captain Bairstow struck a superb 72 from just 39 balls to help his team to an 18-run win over Southern Brave which means the Welsh side now have back-to-back victories. But they will now have to do without Bairstow for the rest of The Hundred as he has now left to be part of England’s Test squad for their series with India.

Under new coach Jarrod Skalde, the Cardiff Devils will take a new approach towards their goaltending for the forthcoming season. The Devils have added a second goaltender to their roster as Canadian Taran Kozun becomes the side’s latest new recruit. The 26-year-old will compete with another new import signing, American Mac Carruth, for the starting […]

By Paul Jones Welsh boxing star Lauren Price dominated her first bout at the Tokyo Olympics on Wednesday and said she was ‘massively’ inspired by her friend Lauren Williams’ performance in taekwondo.  Price who was born in Newport but grew up in Caerphilly is a hot favourite to win gold.  The southpaw was effective with a flurry of shots to Mongolian Myagmarjargal Munkhbat, getting a solid left cross to her opponent’s head in the first round. 

Welsh rower Tom Barras battled to a superb and unexpected Olympic silver medal in Tokyo in the quadruple sculls. Barras – who opted for Welsh qualification while at university in Cardiff – helped Great Britain finally win a medal on the rowing waters on day five of the Games. Harry Leask, Angus Groom, Barras and Jack Beaumont were unfancied in the difficult lane one but they overcame the odds to finish in the podium spots.

Matt Richards and Calum Jarvis have ended Welsh swimming’s long 109-year wait for Olympic gold medals with a magnificent victory in the 4x200m freestyle relay in Tokyo. The Welsh pair were part of a dominant Great Britain squad that struck gold, ahead of the Russian Olympic Committee in second and Australia, who took the bronze. The British quartet won in six minutes 58.58 seconds – an emphatic 3.23secs clear of the Russians and only fractionally outside the world record by three hundredths of a second.

Welsh swimmer Calum Jarvis is now within touching distance of fulfilling his dreams and winning a medal at the Tokyo Olympics. His Team GB relay team were the fastest in their Men’s 4x200m freestyle heats but this success was a long in time in the making, as Tom Prosser discovers. Calum Jarvis was part of the successful Team GB Men’s 4x200m freestyle team this morning alongside fellow Welsh swimmer Matt Richards. Their Team GB finished the heats with the fastest time of 7:03.25 and will now be aiming for a medal in the final which will take place in the early hours of tomorrow morning (Wednesday).

Wales has already contributed to Great Britain’s early medal collection at the Olympic Games in Tokyo when Lauren Williams won a silver medal in taekwondo on Monday. For Williams, an Olympic medal was the realisation of a dream that began in her local club in Caerphilly, Devils Martial Arts Club. Graham Thomas looks at the Olympic roots of the Welsh competitors in Japan. All Olympic dreams start with a more local idea and for Jake Hayward it was wanting to be the fastest kid at Llanishen Fach Primary School. Twelve years on and Jake still wants to cross the line first.

The proverb that good things come to those who wait could have been written for Alys Thomas. On Tuesday lunchtime at the age of 30 – once considered veteran territory in the world of top class swimming – the Swansea-based swimmer will make her Olympic debut. When she steps into the arena in Tokyo, a lot of memories will float through the mind of the current Commonwealth Games 200m butterfly champion.