Ospreys team to play Leicester Tigers

The Ospreys team to place Leicester Tigers at the Liberty Stadium on Friday 12th August 2016, KO 7.15pm, is as follows:

15 Dan Evans

14 Jeff Hassler

13 Ben John

12 Josh Matavesi

11 Tom Grabham

10 Sam Davies

9 Tom Habberfield (Capt)

 

1 Nicky Smith

2 Sam Parry

3 Dmitri Arhip

4 Tyler Ardron

5 Rory Thornton

6 Olly Cracknell

7 Scott Otten

8 Dan Baker

 

REPLACEMENTS

16 Hugh Gustafson

17 Gareth Thomas

18 Maafu Fia

19 Lloyd Ashley

20 Josh Cole

21 Matthew Aubrey

22 Ashley Beck

23 Dafydd Howells

- Ryan Bevington

- Rhys Jones

- Rob McCusker

- Luke Price

- Joe Thomas

- Morgan Williams

(- denotes unnumbered jersey)

  

Ospreys Head Coach, Steve Tandy, said:

We havent had a pre-season game at the Liberty for a few years now so we are looking forward to this one. Therell be a decent crowd and a good buzz about the place at the start of a new year, with a real sense of excitement in supporters that we share as coaches and players.

Its been a long, tough, pre-season but were all looking forward to Friday night and getting back into it. This is the start of the final phase of our prep, with two games against Leicester, one of the leading clubs in Europe, which will give us a real test, sandwiching what should be a good training week in camp in Belgium.

Its an important game for us as we want to build for the opening weekend of the PRO12 in a few weeks. When you look at the team weve picked for this one, its good to see the strength in depth we are building, with some very welcome players returning from injury, and some youngsters who impressed last season who want to build on that. We are still stretched in one or two spots this weekend, with some of the boys still rehabbing and working towards their return to play and a couple of injuries over the summer impacting on our options, but were in a good place going into these games.

Its a chance to get some air in the lungs against opposition who will never be anything less than competitive, and to gauge where we are as a team, as units and as individuals. Theyve done a hell of a lot of work, on their conditioning, skills, technical and tactical, and this is where we start to pull the different strands together, while always remembering that what counts most is where we are in a few weeks time, and in nine or ten months.

 

Forthcoming Fixtures

Fri 19 Aug - 7.30pm (local) KO Belgium v Ospreys - Stade du Pachy

Fri 26 Aug 7.45pm KO Leicester Tigers v Ospreys Welford Road

Fri 2 Sep 7.35pm KO Ospreys v Zebre Liberty Stadium PRO12

Sat 10 Sep 7.35pm KO Connacht v Ospreys Sportsground PRO12

Sat 17 Sep 7.35pm KO - Ospreys v Benetton Treviso Liberty Stadium PRO12