Ellis Jenkins captains new-look Wales side
Wales' Ellis Jenkins (left) and South Africa's Damian Willemse in action during the Autumn Internationals match at Principality Stadium, Cardiff. Picture date: Saturday November 6, 2021. See PA story RUGBYU Wales. Photo credit should read: David Davies/PA Wire. RESTRICTIONS: Use subject to restrictions. Editorial use only, no commercial use without prior consent from rights holder.
Flanker Ellis Jenkins will captain a Wales side which shows seven changes from the team that took on South Africa last weekend.
Jenkins made his international return against the Springboks after a three-year absence and was the team’s best player during their 23-18 defeat in Cardiff.
Head coach Wayne Pivac has made just one change for the match against Fiji, with Thomas Young coming on to the openside flank and Taine Basham moving to number eight in place of the injured Aaron Wainwright.
Josh Adams handed start at centre
Fly-half Dan Biggar remains the cornerstone in a much-changed backline which has six alterations, albeit two of those are positional. Scrum-half Kieran Hardy gets his first opportunity of the Autumn Nations Series with Tomos Williams moving to the replacements bench.
Johnny Williams returns to the centre, having started against New Zealand in the opening round, and he’ll be joined in midfield by Cardiff Rugby’s Josh Adams. With Adams taking up a spot in the centre Louis Rees-Zammit moves to the left wing allowing Ospreys’ Alex Cuthbert an opportunity to come in on the right wing, his first international appearance since November 2017.
Scarlets’ Liam Williams returns to the starting line-up, having last started for Wales in the defeat to France in the 2021 Six Nations.
Loosehead prop Gareth Thomas, loose forward Christ Tshiunza and Callum Sheedy will look to make their first appearances of the campaign from the bench on Sunday.
Tshiunza, who is 19 years old, will be the fourth player to be newly capped by Pivac during the campaign if he gets on.
Commenting on the prospect of the young forward getting an opportunity to make his debut, Pivac said: “He’s come in, he’s trained well and with Ben Carter at 20 years of age and Christ at 19 it’s very exciting. We’re looking at him as a player, in the future, who can hopefully cover two positions, in the second row and at six.
“We’re really looking forward to seeing him out there. He’ll be full of energy, he’s very excited about the opportunity and he’s one for the future.”
The two sides, which will once again feature in the same Rugby World Cup pool in 2023, last faced each other in the pool stages of the competition in Japan, 2019.
“We want to be able to use our squad where we can. In terms of the forwards we don’t have a lot of options with injuries and unavailability. The exciting one is Josh Adams getting an opportunity (at centre). That’s really looking at the future,” Pivac added.
“When you have to pick a World Cup squad of 33, you’ve got to have players that can play in more than one position and we’ve been wanting to do it for a while so we’ll see how Josh goes in the midfield.”
Wales: 15 Liam Williams, 14 Alex Cuthbert, 13 Josh Adams, 12 Johnny Williams, 11 Louis Rees-Zammit, 10 Dan Biggar, 9 Kieran Hardy, 8 Taine Basham, 7 Thomas Young, 6 Ellis Jenkins (c), 5 Adam Beard, 4 Will Rowlands, 3 Tomas Francis, 2 Ryan Elias, 1 Rhys Carré
Replacements: 16 Bradley Roberts, 17 Gareth Thomas, 18 WillGriff John, 19 Christ Tshiunza, 20 Seb Davies, 21 Tomos Williams, 22 Callum Sheedy, 23 Nick Tompkins
Date: Sunday, November 14
Venue: Principality Stadium, Cardiff
Kick-off: 15:15 GMT
Referee: Nic Berry (Australia)
Assistant Referees: Ben O’Keeffe (New Zealand), Gianluca Gnecchi (Italy)
TMO: Stuart Terheege (England)