Dai Sport

The build up for Cardiff’s final home game against Edinburgh began before they had left the pitch at Kingspan Stadium last weekend after a sickening defeat to Ulster. Head coach Matt Sherratt wanted his players to transfer the feeling of bitter disappointment at the end of their 19-17 defeat into the Arms Park clash with the Scottish capital side in a bid to capture that elusive first win of the year.

The Ospreys will be looking to maintain their perfect record against South African opposition when they take the field at Pretoria’s Loftus Versfeld on Saturday. So far this season, they have beaten the Emirates Lions in both the URC and EPCR Challenge Cup, while there have also been league wins against the Hollywoodbets Sharks and, just last weekend, the DHL Stormers.

Cardiff City host Middlesborough in their final home game of the season on Saturday, looking to give the fans a happy farewell to this campaign. After a dramatic, late 2-1 win in their last match at the Cardiff City Stadium, the Bluebirds will hope for another three points to end on consecutive home league victories, for the first time since early March.

Hector Pardoe has revealed he will be vaccinated for typhoid and hepatitis A before he gets into the water for the open water swimming at the Paris Olympics this summer. The Welsh swimmer – one of five Swim Wales stars to be selected by Great Britain for the Games – is due to compete in the 10km open water marathon event, where he is expected to be a medal contender.

Wales will break their attendance record for a stand-alone home Test match, when they face Italy in the Women’s Guinness Six Nations on Saturday at the Principality Stadium. Ioan Cunningham’s side may be facing the prospect of a wooden spoon, but the surge in interest in the women’s game shows no signs of slowing.

Wrexham plan to host another promotion party when they welcome League Two champions Stockport County at The Racecourse on Saturday, in their final game of this season. In what could once have been a match where Wrexham might have won the League Two title in front of their own fans, it is now a game where, regardless of the outcome, both teams’ futures are sealed.

Theo Cabango feels he has returned from injury in even better shape than before and that was certainly how things looked on his first start in more than five months. Back from a lengthy lay-off following a shoulder dislocation, the 22-year-old Cardiff wing scored two scintillating tries in last weekend’s dramatic United Rugby Championship clash with Ulster in Belfast. It looked as though he had completed a hat-trick when he raced over two minutes from time, only for the score to be ruled out for an offence in the build-up, enabling Ulster scrum-half John Cooney to land a match-winning penalty.

It doesn’t need a long, hard stare at the United Rugby Championship table to realise it has not been a vintage season for the Scarlets. The most recent Welsh winners of the tournament seven years ago have won just three matches and stand 14th in the 16-team table. On Friday night, the Scarlets are at home to the Sharks, who are also having a season to forget and have won the same meagre number as their hosts.

Mike Harris - chairman of Cymru Premier dominant force, The New Saints - has welcomed the Football Association of Wales’ plans to improve the league. The FAW has promised an investment package worth more than £739,500 in the on-field product. As part of the revamp, the Cymru Premier is to be increased from 12 clubs to 14 or 16, there will be a switch to Friday night games, and VAR will be introduced to help referees.

There will be a very special father and son reunion in the United Rugby Championship this weekend as John and Taine Plumtree find themselves in opposing camps. If things had worked out differently, they could have been together at the Hollywoodbets Sharks as coach John was keen to bring his boy over to Durban from New Zealand. But Taine, who was born in Swansea while his dad was coaching there, opted to go down the Wales route, joining the Scarlets from the Blues Super Rugby side.