Team Wales DAY 2 Summary
Personal bests, season bests and a Welsh record!
- A strong day 2 for Team Wales
- Emma Finucane clinches a bronze medal in the women’s sprint (cycling)
- New Welsh record set in the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay
- Season bests by Dewi Griffiths, Clara Evans and Nata in the Marathon
LAWN BOWLS
It’s been a highly successful day on the bowling green for Team Wales. First up, in the morning session, the Men’s triples took a storming victory against Norfolk Island scoring 31 points. The Men’s Para Pairs consisting of Paul Brown and Chris Spriggs were narrowly defeated by New Zealand. The pair are still to play more rounds.
Laura Daniels continued her unbeaten run as she claimed victory against India’s Tania Choudury. In round 4, Laura proved too strong once more and bagged another win against Northern Ireland’s Shauna O’Neill.
The men’s pairs made up of Jarrad Breen and Daniel Salmon gained Wales’ fourth win of the day, with a dominant display against Jamaica. Wales won one more round in the afternoon in the Women’s fours. However, the both Men’s pairs (para) registered two defeats in their rounds.
SWIMMING
A busy morning of qualifiers, an evening of semifinals and finals with a full crowd at Sandwell Aquatics Center, with plenty of red shirts and Welsh flags cheering the team on.
FINALS
| Men’s 50m Butterfly | Lewis Frazer 23.71 | 7th |
| Men’s 200m Freestyle | Callum Jarvis 1:47:85 Matthew Richard 1:47:19 | 7th 5th |
| Women’s 100m Butterfly | Harriet Jones 59:02 | 6th |
| Men’s 100m Freestyle Relay Final | 4th |
Charlotte Evans finished 6th and Medi Harris qualified for the 100m backstroke final and said:
“If you’d had told me a year ago that I would be swimming at this level, I wouldn’t have believed you. I’m just so happy and proud to be here and I can’t wait for the final.”
MEN’S RUGBY 7s
The Wales men certainly didn’t make it an easy match for the mighty Fijian side. With a brace of impressive tries from Lloyd Lewis, the match was captivating throughout. Final score Wales 24 – 38 Fiji. This meant they finished 3rd in their pool and so they will play off against other teams finishing 3rd or 4th in their pools.
The first play off match against Malaysia this evening proved that the Wales boys are motivated to play great rugby right till the end, resulting in a 33 – 14 victory for Team Cymru.
Tomorrow they face England in what is set to be a tense fixture in the Coventry Arena.
HOCKEY MEN
A completely dominant display by the Welsh men saw them lead Canada 5-1. Despite some impressive saves from the Canadian Goalkeeper, Gareth Furlong’s drag flicks at penalty corners proved too much and he found himself on the score sheet 4 times. Gareth Griffiths took Wales’ tally to 5 with a stunning strike. Welsh Goalkeeper Toby Reynolds-Cotterill made a series of impressive saves and despite a late comeback goal from the Canadians in the 58th minute, the team held on for a convincing win.
Dan Kyriakides celebrated his 100th Welsh cap.
HOCKEY WOMEN
Indian 3-1 Wales
Despite some incredible defensive and attacking moments on the pitch today, the squad fell to defeat to India. At the end of the first quarter, India converted two penalty corners to double the advantage. Rose Thomas put on an incredible display after making some crucial saves to deny the strong Indian team. Wales pulled a goal back in the third quarter after taking the advantage from a penalty corner, however, not so long after India added to the scoring. All eyes on Tuesday’s game!
SQUASH
Emyr Evans kick started the day for Wales in the squash against Malaysia’s Mohammed Kamal. Evans took the first game 11-8, and showed further domination by taking the second game 11-3. Kamal came back in the first set edging Emyr 11 points to 7. However, Emyr found his strength in the fourth game to take the victory 3 games to 1. Next up was Peter Creed against Canada’s David Baillargeon. The Canadian edged Peter out the first game 11-8, but Creed came out on top in the following game 11-6. However, it wasn’t to be for Peter as Baillargeon took the remaining two games to progress to the next round.
The evening session saw all three Welsh contendants progress. Team Wales flag bearer, Tesni Evans began her campaign for a medal this evening against Barbados’ Amanda Haywood. A dominant opening saw the 2018 bronze medallist take the first two games in quick fashion followed by the third to take the 3-0 victory.
Emily Whitlock was up next in the round of 32 women’s singles against 14-year-old India representative Anahat Singh. Whitlock secured the first two games, but fell short in the third as Singh pulled one back. However, Emily eventually took the victory winning 3-1 and will join Tesni in the round of 16.
To close the Welsh action on the courts seventh seed Joel Makin faced Uganda’s Michael Kawooya. Makin became the fourth Welsh athlete on the courts today to progress as he dominated to win 3-0.
TRACK CYCLING
Emma Finucane claimed her second and Team Wales’ third medal of Birmingham 2022 in the Lee Valley VeloPark.
All three Welsh riders safely progressed into the 1/8 finals of the Women’s Sprint where the 19-year-old raced against Scotland’s Luisa Steele of Scotland, turning in a strong performance to progress.
The all-Welsh match-up between teammates Lowri Thomas and Rhian Edmunds ended in a coming together with Thomas crashing out. She escaped with just a few bumps and bruises but as a result, Edmunds was paired with Olympic champion Kelsey Mitchell in the next round but she lost her best-of-three battle against the Canadian.
Carmarthen-born Finucane faced Kristina Clonan in the ‘best of three’ quarter-finals and lost her first race by a whisker, following a photo finish which recorded the losing margin at just 5/1000 second. However the result was overturned moments later after a transgression by the Australian. She was edged out in her second but won the third to claim a last-four spot against Mitchell, who also boasts the 200m sprint world record.
Mitchell was too strong on the day, winning the first two legs to reach the final while Finucane contested the bronze medal final with England’s Sophie Capewell. She produced a performance full of grit and determination to come from an early setback and pick up her second medal in as many days in front of a raucous home crowd.
Earlier in the day Ella Barnwell (3:34.064) and Anna Morris (3:26.386) had missed out on a top four qualifying spot in the Women’s 3000m Individual Pursuit.
And William Roberts lost his qualifying race with Daniel Bigham of England who set a new Games record of 4.11.078 in the Men’s 4000m Individual Pursuit. Joshua Tarling was beaten by Tom Sexton of Australia.
ATHLETICS (MARATHON)
Large crowds at Smithfield this morning to cheer on the Marathon. First up was Dewi Griffiths who crossed the finish line in 11th place with a season’s best of 2.17.58.
‘’I’m really happy with that, and it’s great to have my family and friends watching. What’s important to me is that I really enjoyed that and I’m happy with the time.’
In the Women’s race, Clara Evans and Natasha Cockram finished in 9th and 12th place respectively. Both had a season’s best (Clara 2.38.03, Natasha 2.40.18).
GYMNASTICS
5th Place Team final
Our young team of 15 and 16 year olds gave a brilliant performance on the competition floor. Despite recent injury, Mali Morgan gave two clean vaults and Poppy Stickler had the arena in uproar with her fantastic and engaging floor routine. Our Welsh supporters were in great voice with some incredible outfits, our Men’s Artistic Team even attended in their julienne McDonald Opening Ceremony suits to support the girls in style. The team can be incredibly proud of their performance with 5 individual qualification sports confirmed.
| All Around Final | Jea Maracha and Poppy Stickler | 31st July 14:30 pm |
| Beam Final | Jea Maracha and Sofia Micallef | 2nd August 14:05 pm |
| Floor Final | Poppy Stickler | 2nd August 15:30 pm |
TABLE TENNIS
ROUND 3
The Women’s team beat fourth seed Canada in the final round of the group stages, to top their group. Three straight matches to win the first saw Chloe Thomas Wu Zhang and Anna Hursey gain the fist game point to take the lead. Next up were the remaining singles matches, Charlotte Carey fell short to Canadian Bronze medalist at the Gold Coast, Mo Zhang who is ranked 153 places above her in the world. With scores all level Hursey returned to the court and gave Wales the lead once again with three straight wins. Wales now 2-1 up Thomas Wu Zhang was up to Mo Zhang but despite her huge effort just fell short. With the scores level once again Carey returned to the court, this time winning all three matches against Sophie Gauthier to send the side through to the Semi-Final.
‘It’s never easy when it goes down to the wire and it’s 2-2 like that, anyone can win with the nerves involved. We definitely put in a good performance, all of us did what we could and we all took one point so we are all really happy with that.
Quarter-Final
Having knocked out fourth seeds Canada earlier today, next up were the hosts, England. They got off to another winning start with duo Chloe Thomas Wu Zhang and Anna Hursey winning 3-1. Next up was Carey to face England Number One Tin Tin Ho. In what was an extremely close contest, Carey edged past her rival for an enormous win on the World Stage, winning her match 3-1. The match point game was now with Hursey. The 16 year old beat Maria Tsaptsinos 3-0 to send the side through to the Semi-Final, winning their game 3-0.
Semi Final : Wales v Malaysia
Time: 18:30