WELSH FANS PROVE THEY ARE THE BEST

Wales captain Gareth Thomas issued an appeal to fans to return lost playing shirts to Stephen Jones and Tom Shanklin after his side beat England 11-9 in the opening match of the RBS Six Nations Championship at Millennium Stadium.

And, on the day WRU bosses announced in excess of £1million in new debenture sales, the fans coach Mike Ruddock has already referred to as ‘the best in the world’ answered the players’ prayers.

Both the missing shirts turned up at team headquarters, the Vale of Glamorgan Hotel, in a box marked “Private & Confidential, FAO Gareth Thomas”.

The anonymous package arrived in the post last week, but Thomas has been out of the country with his club side Toulouse, after sustaining the thumb injury against France that has ruled him out of the rest of the Championship.

But when he opened his mail on return to HQ today, the priceless shirts were there folded neatly in a cardboard box, with £3.45 postage paid!

“The boys are obviously overjoyed,” said Thomas.

“Like I said at the time, the shirts or the only real keepsake the players have of what was an historic victory over England.

“You can understand that they may be a nice memento for a fan and whoever found them would probably want to keep them, but that doesn’t compare to what they mean to the players involved.

“To see them arrive back in the post like that really restores your faith in human nature. We are always saying we have the best fans in the world, but I think this quite categorically proves it!”

Jones and Shanklin are both likely to face Scotland in the penultimate game of the Championship this Sunday, although the team is yet to be announced, and with Wales going into the game currently unbeaten the return of the shirts has given them and the rest of the squad a real boost.

“I want to say thanks personally to whoever has sent them back,” said Jones.

“I hoped my shirt would come back, but if I’m honest I never really thought it would.  But its something for me to keep to remind me of an historic day and for that I’m very grateful.”

Shanklin is equally pleased to have the shirt, which is unique because it is individually embroidered with his cap number, back in safe hands.

“It’s not just symbolic of the win over England, but also of all the hard work it has taken us as a squad to get to the stage were we could beat the reigning world Champions and so it is very special to me,” he added.

And the good news just keeps rolling in at WRU headquarters as bosses also announced another £1million in the bank courtesy of new debenture sales, today.

The 125th Anniversary Debenture Issue was released 10 days ago with up to 800 debentures available for sale at the start of last week and – with the carrot of purchasers being able to buy a ticket for Wales v Ireland if they were quick enough off the mark, by Thursday, £750 000 had already been banked by the WRU for the sale of 125 debentures.

Emails and enquiries have continued to flood in and the figure has now gone up to £1, 098, 000 with 183 seats having been snapped up.

The debentures cost £6000 for a 25 year period, with the full amount being redeemable at the end of the 25 year period.