South Wales in Focus

Latest South Wales News

  • Home
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Sport
  • Science
  • Health
  • Entertainment

Author: Staff

  • Home
  • Sport
by Staff May 17, 2022

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season  Wales Online

  • Health
by Staff May 17, 2022

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash  South Wales Argus

Latest News

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online

May 17, 2022

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus

May 17, 2022

Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph – South Wales Guardian

May 17, 2022

Llandeilo School joins Jubilee performance in Albert Hall | South Wales Guardian – South Wales Guardian

May 17, 2022
by Staff May 17, 2022

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season  Wales Online

Read more
Full view here

Last Saturday signalled the end of a tumultuous grassroots rugby season in Wales.

The Welsh Rugby Union, whose priority this year was ensuring clubs survived the pandemic, took certain steps at the beginning of the term to deal with the impact of Covid-19. As such, the season structure looked a little different compared to years gone by.

One of the key changes was that promotion and relegation was scrapped this year as there were fears that coronavirus could seriously impact the leagues. Sanctions against sides unable to play matches were also put on hold for this season only, again, to acknowledge the impact the pandemic may have.

Read next:Get the latest Welsh rugby headlines sent straight to your inbox for free by signing up to our daily newsletter

The league fixture list was also halved and teams would only play each other once, rather than on a home and away basis.

The WRU recently put out statistics that said player registrations had never been higher but it was at odds with messages from numerous clubs who were struggling to fulfil league fixtures because teams were not able to be raised. There were some instances where this caused particular frustration for teams that had fulfilled their away fixtures but missed out on revenue-driving days at their own clubs when visiting teams pulled out.

Fleur De Lys voiced their anger in March, branding the season a ‘s***show’, with first team manager Dai Thomas telling WalesOnline: “Two teams have already told us that their seasons are over. Teams are using Covid as an excuse when really boys have got weddings and there are other things players are putting before rugby.

“We’ve done everything right, gone through all the protocol but we’ve had teams pulling out at 12 o’clock on Saturday. The boys are already in the club gearing up to go. It’s sad.”

Now that the season is over, it can be seen that not a single of the 24 leagues that sit below the Welsh Premiership played out to their full conclusion. According to figures cross-referenced between the WRU’s website and All Wales Sport, 191 games in total went unplayed, meaning 87% of matches across the board were completed.

For context, during the 2018/19 season – the last unaffected by the Covid-19 pandemic when teams played twice as many league fixtures – the WRU’s website shows that just seven matches were not completed.

Read More
Related Articles
Read More
Related Articles

The best-performing leagues were 1 West C and 3 West B, with 97% of matches in those leagues being played and just two falling by the wayside. Particular areas of concern, though, were League 3 North, where 21 games went unplayed, and League 3 East Central A, where 18 matches were not played.

Three leagues saw a reduction in size with Hartridge withdrawing from League 2 East, Malpas pulling out of League 3 East Central and Banwen leaving League 3 West Central B. Their scheduled fixtures have not been included in our figures. This, however, is an improvement on the 18/19 season, when four teams withdrew from their leagues.

Though it is not all doom and gloom. One highlight of the season came earlier this month when the WRU held the finale of their Road To Principality. There were 32 matches, largely finals, held at the national stadium across nine days, with over 30,000 fans attending and matches streamed live online.

Here’s how the leagues finished up this season…

CHAMPIONSHIP

11 games unplayed

League completion: 88%

Winner: Bargoed

Pontypool RFC fired off a blistering statement when it became apparent they would not be able to complete their season because their opposition were unable to raise a side. It effectively took them out of the title race but it mattered little in the end as Bargoed could not have been caught even if Pontypool had completed all 13 fixtures.

LEAGUE 1 EAST

10 games unplayed

League completion: 85%

Winner: Newbridge

Newbridge pipped Penallta by a point to win League 1 East but both teams had three games that went unplayed, with the title race still very much up in the air. They were due to play each other on May 7 but the game didn’t go ahead.

LEAGUE 1 EAST CENTRAL

8 games unplayed

League completion: 88%

Winner: Mountain Ash

Mountain Ash dominated the league, winning all 10 games they played this season. Even if the league had been completed in its entirety, they would not have been caught.

LEAGUE 1 NORTH

12 games unplayed

League completion: 82%

Winner: Llandudno

The title race was very much still on up north, with Llandudno winning the league ahead of Nant Conwy by two points, however both teams had two games still to play. Nant Conwy were leading but Llandudno won their final game of the season against Bala to go top, which was the league’s only game on the last weekend.

LEAGUE 1 WEST

7 games unplayed

League completion: 89%

Winner: Llangennech

Again, this league may have looked different if all games were played but in the end Llangennech edged ahead of Newcastle Emlyn on the last day of the season. Their game against Aberystwyth was the only one to take place in the league and they won to go two points in front. Newcastle Emlyn had two games remaining while Llangennech had one more to go.

LEAGUE 1 WEST CENTRAL

2 games unplayed

League completion: 97%

Winner: Skewen

It was still all to play for here as well. Skewen won the league level on points with Bonymaen, who ultimately finished second because they lost more games than Skewen, who went unbeaten throughout the season. They both had one game left to play in the league, though.

LEAGUE 2 EAST

5 games unplayed

League completion: 91%

Winner: Ynysddu

Another league that was far from over with Ynysddu ending up on top when the season ended. They were only two points ahead of Talywain and three ahead of Newport High School Old Boys, though. Talywain had three games remaining while the other two had two. Much might have changed. There were only 10 fixtures on offer for teams in this league as Hartridge withdrew.

LEAGUE 2 EAST CENTRAL

5 games unplayed

League completion: 92%

Winner: Abercwmboi

Unbeaten Abercwmboi claimed the title leaving one game on the table, edging ahead of Cowbridge with a victory when the two sides met in late April.

LEAGUE 2 NORTH

8 games unplayed

League completion: 82%

Winner: Wrexham

League winners Wrexham did not play all nine of their matches but won all eight they did play, meaning they topped the league ahead of Nant Conwy 2s. They would not have been caught even if those below them had played all their games and claimed maximum points.

LEAGUE 2 WEST

4 games unplayed

League completion: 94%

Winner: Burry Port

A league that came close to being complete with a number of teams playing the full 11 matches. Burry Port were comfortable winners, tasting defeat just once all term. They were well out of sight and would not have been caught had all games been completed anyway.

LEAGUE 2 WEST CENTRAL

4 games unplayed

League completion: 94%

Winner: Morriston

Another league that might have looked different. Morriston won it in the end by four points from Builth Wells, who themselves had one final game left to play against Maesteg Celtic. Had they won that, Builth would have been champions.

LEAGUE 3 EAST A

10 games unplayed

League completion: 85%

Winner: Abertillery BG

The league was far from completed but there is little doubt about the winners. Abertillery BG would not have been caught by those below them. Usk in second place had two games left to play but trailed by 13 points, plus the leaders themselves had a game left as well.

LEAGUE 3 EAST B

13 games unplayed

League completion: 80%

Winner: Newport Saracens

Another league that didn’t come close to being completed but again there is little doubt over the winners with Newport Saracens going a season without losing a game.

LEAGUE 3 EAST C

9 games unplayed

League completion: 80%

Winner: Crumlin

Malpas withdrew from the league due to dwindling player numbers, meaning there were 10 teams to fight it out. Crumlin topped the pile and still had a game to play but Bettws and Crickhowell were still in the running, with both having two games left unplayed.

LEAGUE 3 EAST D

2 games unplayed

League completion: 90%

Winner: Trefil

The seven-team league came close to completion with Trefil topping the lot with one game going unplayed. Tredegar were still in with a shout though as they had two games left to play and trailed by nine points.

LEAGUE 3 EAST CENTRAL A

18 games unplayed

League completion: 73%

Winner: St Albans

St Albans were clear at the top of the league by 18 points but it was far from nearing completion. Strictly speaking, Llanharan may have caught them had all fixtures been played but they only managed five league games. Fairwater, who only played four league games, were not mathematically out of it either but they trailed by 33 points, so it would have been a very long shot.

LEAGUE 3 EAST CENTRAL B

7 games unplayed

League completion: 89%

Winner: Wattstown

Unbeaten Wattstown were clear winners in this league, finishing nine points ahead of Tonyrefail in second with an impressive points difference of 171. The top three teams all had a game unplayed but Wattstown would not have been caught.

LEAGUE 3 EAST CENTRAL C

2 games unplayed

League completion: 93%

Winner: Tref-y-Clawdd

A very tight finish at the top of this table, with Tref-y-Clawdd sneaking it by the narrowest of margins. They finished level on points, wins, losses and tries scored with Cardiff Saracens. As such the winner of the league was worked out by dividing the points for by points against, with Tref-y-Clawdd’s factor being higher. If Ferndale had played all their games, though, they may well have won the league, trailing the leaders by eight points with two games left to play.

LEAGUE 3 NORTH

21 games unplayed

League completion: 68%

Winner: Ruthin 2s

Mathematically, the top four teams in the league were still in with a shout of winning it but Ruthin 2s had won all nine of the games they’d played, so they would have been a safe bet to go on and finish the job.

LEAGUE 3 WEST A

3 games unplayed

League completion: 95%

Winner: Haverfordwest

A tight finish at the top of this league but Haverfordwest won all 10 of the games they played and had one spare. Lampeter Town also had one game remaining and were still in the running but would have needed Haverfordwest to slip up against 11th-place Llangwm had all the games been played.

LEAGUE 3 WEST B

2 games unplayed

League completion: 97%

Winner: Tumble

A very impressive effort from the teams in this league with just four games going unplayed. All of the top five teams managed to complete all their fixtures with Tumble clinching the league title with a win over Betws on the final day of the season. They overtook Trimsaran by a point.

LEAGUE 3 WEST CENTRAL A

10 games unplayed

League completion: 85%

Winner: Aberavon Green Stars

Unbeaten Aberavon Green Stars won the league despite having two games left to play. Technically, Abercrave and Swansea Uplands – who both had a game left to play – could have overtaken them but would have needed Green Stars to slip up in their final two matches had all games been played.

LEAGUE 3 WEST CENTRAL B

11 games unplayed

League completion: 80%

Winner: Neath Athletic

Losing just one game all season, Neath Athletic were crowd champions having fulfilled all their fixtures. The only team that may have caught them was Bryncethin, who were unbeaten in the five games they played. Banwen withdrew from the league so there were just 10 fixtures per team.

LEAGUE 3 WEST CENTRAL C

7 games unplayed

League completion: 89%

Winner: South Gower

Another league that may well have looked a little different had it been completed with second-placed Tonna and third-placed Pontardawe both in the mix. They had two games remaining each and trailed South Gower, who had played all their matches, by three and five points respectively.

Read More
Related Articles
Read More
Related Articles
by Staff May 17, 2022

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash  South Wales Argus

Read more
Full view here

A WOMAN is in a life threatening condition following a crash in Cwmbran on Monday afternoon, 16 May. 

The 64-year-old woman, who was involved in a crash on New Street in the Pontnewydd area of Cwmbran, is being treated for injuries to her back, head and legs at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff. 

A 22-year-old man from Cwmbran has been arrested on suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous driving. 

A spokesperson for Gwent Police said: “We received a report of a road traffic collision in New Street, Pontnewydd, Cwmbran at around 4.05pm on Monday 16 May.

“Officers attended, along with paramedics from the Welsh Ambulance Service, to assist with traffic management and the collision involved a car and a pedestrian.

“A 64-year-old woman from the Cwmbran area is currently receiving treatment at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff after sustaining injuries to her back, head and legs.

“Her condition is thought to be life threatening.

“A Cwmbran man, 22, was arrested on suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous driving and he was released under investigation as enquires continue.

“Anyone with information about the collision is asked to speak to us.

“We’re asking for anyone who was in New Street between 3.50pm and 4.20pm on Monday 16 May or those with CCTV or dashcam footage to call us on 101 or send us a direct message on Facebook or Twitter, quoting log reference 2200163138, with any details.

“Alternatively, you can call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.”

by Staff May 17, 2022

Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph – South Wales Guardian

Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph  South Wales Guardian

Read more
Full view here

The LTA’s ‘Emma Raducanu Trophy Tour’ is continuing its journey around Britain, with the US Open trophy the centre of attention for pupils at Ysgol Gatholig Cardinal Newman Catholic School in Pontypridd.

Raducanu’s victory at the US Open in September 2021 was a moment that brought the nation together and now the LTA have tapped into the enthusiasm generated by a remarkable sporting moment to spread the message of the game around the country, in a drive to promote the LTA Youth Schools initiative, a programme that Emma is an ambassador for.

After starting out at St Paul’s Way School in London’s Tower Hamlets on Monday, the iconic trophy is plotting a path around Britain that will include stops in Cambridge, Bristol, Pontypridd, Birmingham, Nottingham, Leeds, Middlesbrough, and Edinburgh, with Raducanu delivering a video message at each venue.

On the latest stop of the tour, the pupils of Ysgol Gatholig Cardinal Newman Catholic School in Pontypridd relished the chance to get close to Raducanu’s US Open trophy, whilst also getting outside for an LTA Youth tennis session delivered by an LTA Youth coach.

A special video from Raducanu was played to the students, with the US Open champion continuing to be an inspiration to youngsters across Britain.

“I’m really excited to be teaming up with the LTA to take my US Open trophy on a tour of the country,” said Raducanu. “All the schools we are taking the trophy to have played tennis as part of the LTA Youth Schools programme and my hope is that the trophy will inspire them to continue their tennis journey both inside and outside of school.”

The Trophy Tour, which is a highlight of the LTA’s wider plans to grow tennis, supports LTA Youth, an innovative junior programme aimed to help more children aged 4-18 enjoy tennis. The school’s element of the programme is delivered in Primary and Secondary Schools right across the country and offers free teacher training and content that has been specifically created to help address the nation’s challenge of declining physical literacy and activity among children.

“Emma’s achievement in New York last September inspired so many people from all parts of our community and we are delighted to take her trophy to young people around the country,” said LTA CEO, Scott Lloyd.

“Our vision is to open tennis up – and by sending the Trophy to schools across Britain, our hope is that more children will pick up a racket and try our sport for the first time.”

For more details on the ‘Emma Raducanu Trophy Tour’ click HERE

by Staff May 17, 2022

Llandeilo School joins Jubilee performance in Albert Hall | South Wales Guardian – South Wales Guardian

Llandeilo School joins Jubilee performance in Albert Hall | South Wales Guardian  South Wales Guardian

Read more
Full view here

Llandeilo Primary School will be reaching the rafters next week when it becomes the only school in Wales to sing on the Albert Hall platform for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.

Thirty nine pupils have been selected to join a choir of 2,000 voices from all over the UK to perform on the Queen’s honour at the prestigious London venue next week.

“This is going to be a wonderful learning experience for the children and we know it’s going to provide them with inspiration for their future learning and create memories which will last a lifetime,” said headteacher Karen Towns.

“We’re so proud to represent not only our town and the county of Carmarthenshire but also the country as a whole, as we’re the only school that’s representing Wales.”

The concert, entitled “It Takes A City” will highlight the importance of community, diversity and individuality amongst families across the world, and this echoes Llandeilo school’s philosophy.

Based on the African proverb “it takes a village to raise a child”, this contemporary tale will share the joys and challenges of community living, reminding people that a family is far more than those who live at the family home.

‘It takes a City’ takes place at the Royal Albert Hall next Tuesday, May 24.

Llandeilo itself is no newcomer to memorable music events, the 20th annual Llandeilo Fawr Festival of Music is back on the books this year having been put aside by Covid in the past two years.

This invitation is a wonderful example of what can happen when a small town like Llandeilo achieves artistic prominence by consistently hosting a successful Festival involving schools and other organisations in the town.

Julia Jones, Artistic Director of Llandeilo Fawr Festival of Music said: “We attach great importance to this outreach branch of the Festival and we are extremely grateful, not only to Armonico Consort, for extending the invitation to Llandeilo Primary School, but to the school’s Head and Staff, for their co-operation and support, and to the children, for their aptitude and enthusiasm which deserved the invitation in the first place.” 

by Staff May 17, 2022

First look at Russell Crowe in Arclight Films’ ‘Poker Face’ (exclusive) – Screen International

First look at Russell Crowe in Arclight Films’ ‘Poker Face’ (exclusive)  Screen International

Read more
Full view here

Arclight Films kicks off worldwide sales this week and has released an exclusive first image from the thriller Poker Face directed by and starring Russell Crowe alongside Liam Hemsworth.

Crowe plays a billionaire gambler who offers his best friends the chance to win more money than they have ever dreamed of. However, in return, they will have to give up the secrets they have spent their lives protecting and will learn the true nature of what is at stake.

Elsa Pataky and Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA round out the key cast on the Hamilton Entertainment production, which shot in New South Wales, Australia, and is in post-production. Crowe co-wrote the screenplay with Stephen M. Coates.

Poker Face marks the second directorial outing for Gladiator star Crowe after The Water Diviner, which won the Australian Academy award for best film in 2015. Hemsworth’s credits include The Hunger Games franchise and Quibi series Most Dangerous Game.

Arclight’s Gary Hamilton produces with Keith Rodger, Ying Ye, and Ryan Hamilton alongside Addam Bramich, Catchlight Studios’ Jeanette Volturno and Jason Clark and Matt Williams.

Executive producers are Arclight Films’ Brian Beckmann, Walter Josten, Joe Thomas, Mikael Borglund, Romilda De Luca and Alceon Entertainment Partners alongside Julia Stuart and Laura Grange from Sky.

Poker Face is financed by MEP Capital, Alceon Entertainment Partners, Sky and Australian funding entities through the New South Wales government’s Screen NSW Made in NSW fund. Co-producer Sky will release Poker Face as a Sky Original in the UK and Germany.

Arclight Films’ slate includes The Portable Door starring Christoph Waltz and Sam Neill; thriller The Locksmith with Ryan Phillippe, Kate Bosworth and Ving Rhames; and dark comedy Big Gold Brick starring Andy Garcia, Emory Cohen, Megan Fox and Oscar Isaac.

by Staff May 17, 2022

Australian election: Where is climate change on the agenda? – Al Jazeera English

Australian election: Where is climate change on the agenda?  Al Jazeera English

Read more
Full view here

Canberra, Australia – As southern Australia continues to recover from the destruction of the 2019-2020 ‘Black Summer’ bushfires, towns in Queensland and New South Wales (NSW) have just experienced devastating floods.

Some towns have even seen ‘once in 100 year’ floods occur twice in several weeks. In Lismore, an NSW town of nearly 30,000 people, the river rose more than 14 metres in late February, breaching the town’s levees and inundating people’s homes and businesses. Thousands of residents were forced to take refuge on their roofs.

Lismore flooded again in March. More than 2,000 homes are now considered uninhabitable.

While Lismore has flooded five times in the past 60 years, this year’s floods were 2 metres above the previous historic high. Across NSW and Queensland, 22 people died.

As with the Black Summer bushfires, the federal government has been criticised for being too slow to respond. Locals relied on their own communities to provide crucial assistance in the immediate aftermath of the disaster and Lismore residents later took their flood-damaged belongings to Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s official residence, dumping ruined armchairs and soft toys at his gate. Some held placards that read ‘Your climate inaction killed my neighbour’.

The cost of the floods is expected to exceed 2 billion Australian dollars ($1.44 bn), making it one of the country’s most costly natural disasters ever.

“Despite decades of warnings from scientists about climate change, Australia is unprepared for the supercharged weather that it is now driving,” said Hilary Bambrick, co-author of Australia’s annual assessment of progress on climate adaptation.

“Australia is at the forefront of severe climate change … Climate change means that Australia’s extreme weather – heat, drought, bushfires and floods – will continue to get much, much worse if we don’t act now.”

Despite this and voters’ desire for action, climate change has barely been a talking point in campaigning for the country’s federal election, which will take place in less than a week on May 21.

“Australians are hyper concerned about climate change,” University of Tasmania political scientist Kate Crowley told Al Jazeera. ”But the major parties, especially the [ruling] Coalition, don’t want to talk about climate change. For them, it’s done and dusted.

“The Coalition has a ‘never never’ target and no immediate plans to do anything, except ensure fossil fuels are in the mix.”

A crew member surveys the devastation caused by the flooding in Lismore. The government was criticised for being too slow to respond to the disaster [Bradley Richardson/Australian Defence Force via AFP]

Most politicians in Scott Morrison’s Liberal-National Coalition are climate change sceptics, if not outright deniers, as well as being economically and socially conservative.

Climate writer Ketan Joshi has been tracking politicians’ social media mentions of climate change.

He found that just four percent of tweets from senators and three percent of tweets from members of parliament mentioned climate in the first week of the campaign. Most did not tweet about climate change at all.

“Tweets are a proxy for discourse,” Joshi explained. “It’s a really simple read on [the issue’s] prominence, and it turns out that even when climate is mentioned in bad faith, it’s still only a tiny, tiny proportion of the discussion.”

Joshi believes there are two main reasons for the lack of discussion around climate change.

“One is that the issue isn’t prominent enough, considering its physical urgency,” he said. “The second is that when it is discussed, it’s always on the back of something going wrong, as opposed to an initiated effort to talk about a really important issue.”

Since I’m storing tweets anyway, I thought I’d create an auto-generating weekly summary of how politicians and the press gallery are mentioning climate, fossils and clean tech.

Here’s the first week. More features to come in the next report, but for now……you get the picture pic.twitter.com/1baUB5u9BC

— Ketan Joshi (@KetanJ0) April 18, 2022

The only moment when climate change has emerged as a serious point of discussion in recent weeks was when Queensland Nationals Senator Matt Canavan – claiming decisions on climate change could be left for 10 or 20 years time – declared net zero to be “dead” and “all over bar the shouting”.

“Canavan actually put climate on the agenda,” explained Crowley. “The Coalition were quite happy to ignore questions [on it] and just repeat policies … After all, they’ve got a target without really having a target.”

Most voters want action

Poll after poll has found that the majority of Australians want to see the government take serious action on combating climate change.

National broadcaster ABC runs Vote Compass, the country’s largest survey of voter attitudes. In this year’s poll, 29 percent of those surveyed ranked climate change as the issue most important to them. This was higher than any other single issue, even in the face of the increasing cost of living, which 13 percent rated as the biggest issue.

In mid-2021, a YouGov poll conducted for the Australian Conservation Foundation found that climate change was an important issue for 67 percent of voters, including 28 percent who said it was the single most important issue in determining who they would vote for.

Crucially, a majority of voters in all 151 of Australia’s federal electorates believe that the government of Scott Morrison should have been doing more to tackle climate change. Even in key coal regions such as the Hunter Valley, voters did not believe new coal and gas plants should be built.

Students in Sydney went on strike earlier this month to demand further action on climate change. Younger Australians are particularly concerned about climate issues [File: Loren Elliott/Reuters]

Polls have also found that young Australians are especially concerned about climate change. A 2021 survey from the Foundations For Tomorrow initiative found that 93 percent of Australians under 30 think the government is doing too little to tackle climate change.

Some 88 percent of Australians aged 18 to 24 are enrolled to vote, and voting is compulsory in Australia.

Assessing the policies

Many voters say they feel that there is little substantial difference between the Coalition and the Labor Party, who are currently in opposition, especially on climate change.

The Coalition has set a target to reduce emissions by 26 to 28 percent by 2030, based on 2005 levels. To do so, they say they will not move away from heavy polluters such as coal and gas but instead rely on carbon capture and storage, alongside new low emission technologies. The exact technologies have not been specified, mostly because they do not yet exist.

The Labor Party, led by Anthony Albanese, holds a 43 percent emissions reduction target by 2030, still below the expert-recommended target of 50 to 75 percent. If elected in May, Labor plans to invest heavily in renewables, creating more than 600,000 jobs in the process. Labor also has detailed strategies for supporting workers’ transition from fossil fuels to other sectors.

The Coalition and Labor agree that net zero should be achieved by 2050, yet both receive significant donations from the mining industry, more than any other sector. As with the Liberal Party, Labor will not sign the UN pledge to end coal fire power if elected.

Despite several high-profile commitments from energy producers such as AGL to shut down coal and gas plants earlier than previously planned, both major political parties have committed to continuing to support fossil fuels.

There are 114 new coal and gas projects on the government’s official register, such as the controversial gas extraction project in the Northern Territory’s Beetaloo Basin. Altogether, these projects would increase Australia’s emissions by more than 250 percent.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Coalition and Anthony Albanese’s Labor party both remain supportive of the polluting coal industry, claiming it is a crucial part of the economy and provides vital jobs for the working class [File: Mick Tsikas/AFP]

Despite the public concern, the Australian fossil fuels lobby has proved remarkably strong, claiming that mining props up the Australian economy – it contributes about 10 percent of the country’s gross domestic product and employs 261,000 people – and that without it, financial disaster looms.

The lobby has also used class rhetoric to place coal mining as a central element of regional working-class politics, encouraging both major parties to see being pro-fossil fuels as a vote winner.

The Greens – a left-wing environmental party often referred to as Australia’s ‘third party’ – are the only group to have argued the need for Australia to do more on climate. It has set a lofty 75 percent target for emissions reductions by 2030 and wants to see net zero achieved by 2035 or earlier, primarily through ending the mining, burning, and export of thermal coal by 2030.

The Greens’ campaign material describes net zero by 2050 as “a death sentence”. The party is now calling for a moratorium on new coal, gas, and oil projects.

“The mining and burning of coal and gas are the leading causes of the climate crisis,” said the Greens’ Adam Bandt of the demand.

“Keeping coal and gas in the ground is the very first thing a government would do if they were serious about treating global heating like the climate emergency that it is.”

One big question remains, however.

Just how much will voters actually put their climate concerns first when it comes to election day?

At the polling station, local issues can sometimes seem much more urgent.

Australia has a powerful fossil fuels lobby and there are 114 new coal and gas projects on the government’s official register [File: Jason Reed/Reuters]

Inflation is at its highest in 20 years, with the price of everyday items like vegetables, meat, and petrol all increasing thanks to the war in Ukraine as well as the floods earlier this year.

Skyrocketing house prices and rents are also at the forefront of many people’s minds, as are key issues that were highlighted during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, such as aged care. And the central bank has just hiked interest rates for the first time since 2010.

“People have very much separated climate and politics,” agreed Joshi. “Someone can see climate change as an important issue, but still have a [negative] gut reaction to supporting the Greens.

“It’s worth noting that people will often express strong support for climate action in surveys, but have very confused and mixed views when it comes to its immediacy.”

by Staff May 17, 2022

Strong response to SEP final election campaign meeting in Australia – WSWS

Strong response to SEP final election campaign meeting in Australia  WSWS

Read more
Full view here

The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) stepped up its federal election campaign with a well-attended online public meeting last Sunday, six days before the May 21 national ballot. The live-streamed event can be viewed below, with speakers presented in designated chapters with accompanying graphs and photographs.

SEP National Secretary Cheryl Crisp chaired the meeting with reports delivered by Oscar Grenfell, Mike Head and Peter Byrne, who are contesting Senate seats in New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria respectively. Max Boddy, John Davis and Jason Wardle, the party’s other Senate candidates in Australia’s east coast states, answered questions during the meeting’s lively Q&A session.

Crisp set the meeting in a broader and higher historical and global context by referring to the recent imaging of Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy. This monumental scientific breakthrough was the result of coordinated work by hundreds of astronomers, engineers and support staff from 60 institutions across 20 countries.

This was an extraordinary example of “what international collaboration of human labour, science and technology can achieve,” Crisp said. She contrasted it to the reactionary nationalist response of capitalist governments around the world to COVID-19. The catastrophic death toll from the pandemic, and the rising danger of a third world war, along with worsening global poverty and other social ills, she said, were products of the nation-based capitalist profit system.

“If the approach which guided the study of Sagittarius A* was adopted to all aspects of society—conscious, scientific planning, international collaboration, the necessary resources allocated—the world would be a very different place. But that would require the reorganisation of society as a whole and the reallocation of society’s wealth from the tiny wealthy few to the mass of the world’s population.”

This historic mission, Crisp continued, could not be achieved by futile appeals to governments, capitalist parties or trade unions but by the international working class, united with science, in the struggle to overthrow capitalism.

Oscar Grenfell told the meeting that the federal election had sharply revealed the degenerated character of the political establishment and the rising mass disaffection and anger of millions of people. These processes, he continued, were being intensified by COVID-19, the US-led proxy war in Ukraine against Russia, and unrelenting government and big business attacks on the working class in every country.

The election campaigns of the parliamentary parties and associated media coverage, he said, involved a “conspiracy of silence” to suppress any discussion of these crucial questions. This was prepared by last year’s bipartisan anti-democratic electoral laws to deregister the SEP and other parties without parliamentary seats, in the leadup to the election.

“The coming together of Labor and the Coalition to pass these laws summed up the real political situation. Behind the insults and theatrics between Albanese and Morrison, Labor and the Liberals agree on all the substantive questions,” he said.

“Irrespective of which party forms government,” Grenfell warned, “its program will be massive spending cuts, aimed at forcing the working class to pay for the billions of dollars given to the corporations during the pandemic and to fuel the war drive.”

Mike Head pointed out that the SEP was the only party in the election opposing the reckless US-led war drive, now directed against both Russia and China. He reviewed the historical and economic roots of the Ukraine conflict and its catastrophic trajectory.

“The aim of the US-NATO operation is not only gaining access to the vast resources of Russia—oil, gas, countless strategic minerals. Washington views the defeat of Moscow as a decisive step toward a military confrontation with China to establish US domination over the entire Eurasian landmass,” he said.

“Our election campaign is part of the fight by our world party, the International Committee of the Fourth International, to clarify the immense dangers and mobilise the working class in a global anti-war movement and for socialist internationalism. This is the only way to end the threat of a catastrophic third world war.”

Peter Byrne’s report, which focused on the emerging struggles of the working class in Australia and internationally, used a segment of Eric London’s video presentation to the recent May Day 2022 online event to illustrate this new global reality.

The speaker drew attention to the collapse of the Sri Lankan economy and the eruption of nationwide demonstrations and two general strikes against soaring food and fuel prices and demanding the resignation of President Rajapakse and his entire government.

The speaker pointed to rising inflation in Australia and the escalating attacks on workers’ jobs, wages and social conditions. He referred to the SEP’s intervention into strike action by the Dyson bus drivers in Melbourne and reviewed the key demands outlined in the socialist action program for the working class set out in the SEP’s election statement.

Byrne said the SEP was not oriented to the rotten parliamentary set-up but to the emerging struggles of the working class, as seen in recent strikes by nurses, aged care and other health workers, teachers, bus drivers and others. He stressed that these struggles could be taken forward only through the establishment of workplace rank-and-file committees, independent of the trade unions, which had strangled workers’ struggles for decades.

Byrne pointed to the vital work being conducted by the Committee for Public Education, the Australia Post rank-and-file committee and the health workers’ rank-and-file group, which were initiated by the SEP. “This is just the beginning of what workers need to do to advance their interests on the basis of a socialist program of action,” Byrne said.

The SEP meeting stood in sharp contrast to the highly-orchestrated election meetings held by the Liberal-National Coalition, Labor and the Greens. These are anti-democratic events, with no questions or discussion allowed.

SEP election meetings encourage maximum participation and discussion about the party’s policies. Engaged audience members at Sunday’s meeting peppered SEP candidates for more details on the party’s program and analysis during the extended Q&A session, which is included in the video broadcast.

Questions were asked, and fully answered, about the NATO-led war against Russia in Ukraine, how to get accurate COVID-19 infection figures, Australia’s anti-democratic preferential voting system, the role of identity politics, the policies of the “teal independent” candidates, socialism and small business, the nature of parliament, political corruption and many other issues.

Almost $5,000 was donated to the SEP’s special election fund, a generous measure of the enthusiastic response to the meeting and the party’s campaign. Speakers urged all participants to join the SEP to help build the revolutionary socialist working-class leadership needed in Australia and internationally.

Please share the election meeting video widely on social media and get in touch with the SEP to join the party or assist in the final days of the election campaign.

Contact the SEP:
Phone: (02) 8218 3222
Email: sep@sep.org.au
Facebook: SocialistEqualityPartyAustralia
Twitter: @SEP_Australia
Instagram: socialistequalityparty_au
TikTok: @SEP_Australia

Authorised by Cheryl Crisp for the Socialist Equality Party, Suite 906, 185 Elizabeth Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000.

Join the SEP campaign against anti-democratic electoral laws!

The working class must have a political voice, which the Australian ruling class is seeking to stifle with this legislation.

Related Topics
Find out more about these topics:
by Staff May 17, 2022

Grand Union wants to boost rail links between South Wales and London – Business Traveller – Business Traveller

Grand Union wants to boost rail links between South Wales and London – Business Traveller  Business Traveller

Read more
Full view here

Open access firm Grand Union has applied to operate a new service between South Wales and London.

Previously Grand Union had wanted to run between Cardiff and London.

But its application was dismissed by regulator the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) because of “revenue abstraction” (a term favoured by the rail industry) from incumbent GWR.

So Grand Union has returned with a modified plan which ought to produce greater benefits for the South Wales area. It therefore hopes the ORR will look favourably on its latest application.

What Grand Union wishes to do now is launch a service between Carmarthen and London (the terminus is not named but is likely to be Paddington).

If the operator gets the green light the service would launch with Cardiff-London in May 2023. This would see Grand Union competing with GWR.

The service would be extended to serve Llanelli and Carmarthen from May 2025.

A park and ride station would be built at Felindre close to junction 46 of the M4.

Services would call at the above station and bypass Swansea thus reducing journey time to London by 20 minutes. Further details are not available at time of writing.

Grand Union claims “This new service will bring more journey opportunities, wider economic benefits and significant employment to the people of South Wales”.

However train operators (TOCs) like GWR pay hefty franchise fees to the government and the latter protects their interests.

Open access firm Lumo was the last operator to gain approval.

It now competes on the London-Edinburgh flagship route in competition with incumbent LNER.

Lumo train service to launch next month

Lumo won the right to compete with LNER because it was bringing a different product (one which would compete with domestic air) to the route.

It remains to be seen whether or not the ORR will view this latest application from Grand Union in a different light.

Meanwhile Grand Union still awaits a decision on its proposal to operate Stirling-London.

Grand Union seeks Stirling-London rights

granduniontrains.co.uk

by Staff May 16, 2022

James Butler · Short Cuts: Limping to Success · LRB 26 May 2022 – London Review of Books

James Butler · Short Cuts: Limping to Success · LRB 26 May 2022  London Review of Books

Read more
Full view here

Early​ results matter in politics. The news on the morning of 6 May seemed to confirm a familiar story. Labour had taken two totemic Tory councils, Wandsworth and Westminster, piling on metropolitan voters but failing to ignite the electorate outside the cities. Tory losses were bigger than expected, and by the end of the day looked very bad indeed: the cumulative loss was 485 seats; before the election the Mail had warned that anything over four hundred should be seen as a ‘disaster’.

The Tories’ loss was so obvious that what has happened since seems puzzling. Many who had expected the Conservative collapse assumed that the party’s backbenchers would take the opportunity to dispatch Johnson in its wake. Some deposed council leaders did call for his head. But, so far, letters to the chair of the 1922 Committee don’t seem to be pouring in. Perhaps Tory MPs are persuaded by the implausible argument that changing leaders while Russia’s war in Ukraine continues would be irresponsible; or perhaps they are newly enthused by the prospect that Keir Starmer might be forced to resign over Beergate. Or maybe they read the success of the Liberal Democrats as a sign of returning political normality, and are seeking comfort in shopworn political wisdom: this is a midterm result, like 2003 or 2013, recoverable at the next general election; it’s unwise, after all, to base a national strategy on protest votes, or on a desultory turnout of people primarily concerned about bin collections. Other, cannier Tories might recognise that people can’t heat their homes with ever deferred promises of ‘levelling up’, or fill their stomachs with culture wars. Given the improbable geography of the Johnson majority, and the likelihood of recession and inflationary wage pressures before the next general election, Tory MPs of 2019 vintage would be fools to assume that the political volatility of the last several years is over.

If Tory MPs are sleeping surprisingly well it is also because there has been no flip to the other pole of British politics: were these results translated nationally they would result in a hung Parliament. Should the polls stay where they are, the next campaign will no doubt feature posters of Keir Starmer peering out of Nicola Sturgeon’s handbag. But Tory MPs should be wary of putting too much faith in myths about political change in Britain. First past the post electoral systems do often produce strong majorities, but in the 21st century significant shifts have been preceded by hung Parliaments: an element of stickiness persists in the system. Tories can take more comfort, perhaps, in the sense that the ideological architecture of British politics – what issues matter to the press, and the terms in which they can be talked about – remains stubbornly unipolar, especially when it comes to economics, immigration and crime. That conservatives of various stripes set the agenda sometimes leads non-Tories to dream of all non-conservative parties putting aside their differences and forming an electoral compact to dislodge the Tories from power. But it isn’t at all clear that voters en masse would be attracted to what could easily be painted as cartel politics.

Three interrelated stories emerged from the final results: the enduring importance of political geography, the re-emergence of third parties, and a dimming of the Brexit effect. The simplest part of the picture is the success of the Liberal Democrats, who gained 223 council seats. The Lib Dems toppled the Tories in West Oxfordshire, which includes David Cameron’s old seat in Witney (though Witney itself voted Labour), and one of the major threats to a future Tory majority comes from the southern marginals once swept by Cameron’s party. Yet what should draw just as much attention is the performance of the Greens. Since 2018 they have more than doubled their councillors in England, making 63 gains, including in areas – South Tyneside, Hastings – not typically associated with the party. They seem to have learned from the Liberal Democrats’ long experience in taking advantage of local political conditions, though the Greens still suffer under first past the post in progressive urban centres such as Lambeth, where their voters are under-represented. Had a right-wing populist party achieved something similar – sitting Ukip councillors were effectively obliterated in this election – the British press would have discovered in the results an urgent, previously unheard political demand. The Greens don’t have that luck: a difficult question for the party is whether its adaptability – sometimes, for example, it is able to modulate its politics through local hostility to development – renders it inchoate at a national level. Yet it is only at the national level that the Greens’ central political concerns can properly be grasped.

Outside England, the results in Britain cemented national divergences. Scottish Labour returned its best results in a decade, though they represent only a slight easing of the party’s nuclear winter (in 2012 it received 31.4 per cent of first preference votes; this time it was 21.7 per cent). Labour’s return to second place is an artefact of the cratering of the Tory vote after a brief surge under Ruth Davidson; Douglas Ross blamed Partygate, but the disappearance of the party’s sole likeable and competent leader played a more salient role. The SNP’s hegemony remains untroubled. In Wales, Labour made impressive advances. Mark Drakeford, the party’s leader in Wales, immediately capitalised by proposing – jointly with Plaid Cymru – further electoral reform to the Senedd. That idea remains taboo for Labour in Westminster: the party shares the Tories’ commitment to FPTP mostly out of inertia and inanition, but also because it still dreams of forming a strong majority and gaining untrammelled command of the state. Many of Labour’s strategists pride themselves on being hard-headed realists, steered above all by the facts. Here’s an inconvenient fact for them: the UK’s constituent nations have moved further apart. The national share projected on the basis of these elections looks similar to the profile of the 2005 general election, in which Blair won a majority of more than sixty seats. But without the Scottish seats it had then, Labour would find itself with a minority government at best.

The truly momentous event on 5 May was Sinn Féin’s victory in the Assembly elections in Northern Ireland. As Newsnight’s unusually honest and assiduous reporter Lewis Goodall put it in a clip widely shared on social media, this was a result that the North’s political constitution was once supposed to make impossible. It had been coming, however, and for three reasons: Sinn Féin’s modernisation, gradual demographic changes in the North, and – more recently – the reinvention of Alliance as a liberal centrist force. The DUP’s blundering also played a key role: the £300 million left unspent in the wake of its withdrawal from government in February has featured in every other party’s campaign. Northern Ireland has the highest rate of economic inactivity and the lowest productivity in the UK; it also has the longest NHS waiting lists. The cost of living crisis bites everywhere, but it is especially sharp here. The DUP’s objections to a Republican first minister have been replaced, since the election, by a refusal based on the Brexit protocol – which could delay the formation of a government, and the passing of a budget, for months. Commentary in Britain has focused on the prospect of a border poll: it’s true that these results make it thinkable, but they don’t make it likely anytime soon. Concerns closer to home – eating, heating, working – are more pressing. It is hard to imagine that voters will applaud Jeffrey Donaldson for blocking any chance to solve them. The government’s plan to rip up the protocol, which would probably plunge Britain into a recession, may give him the pretext for a climbdown.

A renewed conflict with Brussels may well also reanimate Brexit divides in England. For Labour, that would be ruinous. Concealed by its apparent stasis in England are signs that the party is profiting from voters repulsed by the Tories in government, including in its lost ‘Red Wall’ seats, where its share of the vote increased. There are reasons Labour doesn’t tell this story clearly. It requires admitting both that Corbyn’s Labour did well in 2018, when these seats were last in play, and that its results in 2019 were catastrophic. Every faction in the party dislikes one or other of these facts. Because of the successes of 2018, many of the reversions to Labour since 2019 – Kirklees, Wakefield, Bolton – don’t resonate as clearly as they might. Nor are they uniform: Grimsby remains lost and, outside the Red Wall, Dudley has embraced the Tories more closely. Taken with Labour victories in Leave-voting pockets of the South – Southampton, Worthing – the suggestion might be that the Brexit divide is waning. But however you look at it, this is not a picture of a party sweeping all before it: the humiliation of dire Labour administrations in Tower Hamlets and Croydon, and Bristol’s rejection of its high-handed Labour mayor – it voted to abolish the office altogether – do not suggest widespread enthusiasm. Labour has limped to success through Tory failure. It is a poor basis for hope.

Councillors are often annoyed by journalists’ habit of interpreting local results through a national lens. It isn’t just laziness: Britain does have a centralised power structure and weak councils. Constrained though they are, however, councils are not powerless. Labour policy may be in a deep freeze at national level, but some of its new councils have distinctive plans. Wandsworth’s campaign focused heavily on a council housing revolution to counterbalance the luxury glass acreage in the north of the borough. On the diminished Labour left, the Preston Model of insourcing and local regeneration still holds pride of place; adapting municipal socialism of this kind in a prosperous London borough will take ingenuity and careful strategic thought, not least to avoid spooking tax-sensitive local liberals. Even so, that such plans could even be considered in a borough once thought of as a laboratory for Thatcherism marks an enduring shift in English urban politics.

At a national level, though, the immediate future looks grim. Any political profit Labour might have turned from the elections has evaporated in the face of Beergate; now that Starmer has offered up his career as a hostage to Durham Constabulary, there will be weeks of press agitation as the investigation spins on. Even if he escapes a fine, the narrative will be either that he lent on the police, or that he has dodged resignation on a technicality. Every second spent on this is time not spent on the cost of living crisis, the single issue most likely to dislodge Johnson’s government. Starmer must know this, as he must also know that 1.3 million people will fall into absolute poverty this year, that 40 per cent of Britons will face fuel poverty, and that 6.8 million Britons already skip meals or eat less than they need.

The Tories should be worried, all the same, about the contents of the Queen’s Speech. The government’s legislative programme is thin, and targeted solely at its core voters. One official briefed that the time of ‘pain relief’ for the cost of living was over, and that it is now time for the ‘surgery the economy needs’. The bill on workers’ rights promised twenty times over has disappeared; promises to steamroller nimbyism in housing development have vanished and the manifesto promise to build 300,000 new homes a year has been abandoned. The proposed rolling back of human rights, clampdowns on protesters and asylum seekers, the privatisation of Channel 4: these are signs of a party out of ideas, disconnected from the real world, and running on autopilot.

13 May

Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Share Email Print Letters

Send Letters To:

The Editor
London Review of Books,
28 Little Russell Street
London, WC1A 2HN

letters@lrb.co.uk

Please include name, address, and a telephone number.

by Staff May 16, 2022

Football team turn up at tearful founder’s house to celebrate moments after game he was too poorly to attend – Wales Online

Football team turn up at tearful founder’s house to celebrate moments after game he was too poorly to attend  Wales Online

Read more
Full view here

Every now and then, we are reminded of the power of sport and how it knits together our communities up and down the country. A football club in Bridgend has managed to encapsulate that better than anyone with their promotion-winning celebrations.

For every Liverpool, who won the FA Cup final on Saturday, there were thousands of Cefn Cribwr FCs up and down the country, popping the bubbles after winning a promotion for which they had toiled all season long. There is a very poignant reason, though, that this celebration video has gone viral.

Following the 4-2 triumph over Blaenrhondda on Saturday, a win which booked Cefn Cribwr a spot in the third tier of the Welsh football pyramid, Champagne corks were popped and jubilant celebrations ensued at their Cae Gof base. But there was one very notable absentee.

Club icon Gary Davies, 79, who founded Cefn Cribwr FC back in 1976, has been unable to attend any matches this season, the first time that has ever been the case. Usually an ever-present, Mr Davies has largely been confined to his home owing to arthritis and undergoing hip replacement surgery.

Given Mr Davies is the heartbeat of the club, the players and coaches felt it was only right they made a beeline for his house, still fully kitted out in Cefn Cribwr’s royal blue strip. His wife, Sandra, opened the door to a chorus of “We are going up, say we are going up!” and “We love you Gary, we do!”

Mr Davies and his wife were clearly taken aback by such a gesture and it certainly struck a chord with the thousands who saw the viral video over the course of the weekend, too. “It was a wonderful moment”, Mr Davies said. “I was over the moon, taken aback and a bit teary.”



Cefn Cribwr FC celebrated by taking their promotion party to the front door of their founder and club icon, Gary Davies (Image: Cefn Cribwr FC)

“Gary has been first-team manager, second-team manager, secretary, he has done everything in the club,” first-team boss Scott Dryden told WalesOnline. “You speak to anyone locally and say ‘Gary Davies’, they say, ‘Cefn Cribwr Boys Club’. He is that sort of character, the character every club has to have. He is the leader, the one who installed true values into the club.

“He made sure we remain an amateur club. Although we have been in the South Wales Alliance League Premier Division, there are a lot of clubs in that league who pay players. My boys pay £6 a week to play football. So it makes the story even more remarkable that we have had three promotions in six years, going up through the Alliance League pyramid and we have finally reached our goal, to get into the Welsh league or what is now the Ardal Leagues and we are now in the South West division for next season.”



Cefn Cribwr FC players celebrate after beating Blaenrhondda 4-2 to seal promotion (Image: Cefn Cribwr FC)

It is clearly an emotional moment for the club stalwart, given the club he founded has just reached its highest-ever league position thanks to the win over Blaenrhondda at the weekend. The club have been blown away by the reaction, but, according to the manager, Mr Davies deserves all the recognition he is getting after decades of hard work.

“Gary has been in ill health, he has had a hip replacement within the last six months, so at his age now it’s difficult for him to get over,” Dryden, 50, added. “He hasn’t watched a single game this season, it’s the first season he has never seen a game over at Cae Gof.

“A lot of the lads don’t really know him, either, the lads who came in this season, but they’ve embraced the ethos he has installed in the club. We just felt it was right to go over, in our kit, a few bottles of champagne, to Gary’s house and go and celebrate with him!

“It was very emotional. The first person to the door was his wife, Sandra, who has obviously been with him for years, they have been married 55 years or whatever. Sandra is every bit a part of Cefn Cribwr as Gary is, she has been on the ride as well.

“It was very emotional, you can see from Sandra. And Gary also put a few quid behind the bar for the boys afterwards as well. He is a legend, he really is. Cefn Cribwr, it just runs through his blood.”

It was a rollercoaster end to the season for the Bridgend county club. They had been in the top two for 27 out of 30 weeks of the season, but with three games to go they found themselves needing four points after Canton Liberal FC had usurped them in the standings. Nothing less than a win would do on the final day, having thrown away a one-goal lead in the final five minutes against Merthyr Saints FC the week before to lose 2-1.

And, 10 minutes into the second half against Blaenrhondda on Saturday, it looked as though the dream was hurtling towards its end when they found themselves 2-1 down against the Rhondda side. But thanks to a hat-trick from 18-year-old Aaron Weaver, the youngest player in their squad, and a goal from Matthew Symons, Cefn Cribwr romped to victory and the celebrations really began in earnest.



Cefn Cribwr FC players celebrate on the pitch (Image: Cefn Cribwr FC)

Now, though, the real work begins, according to Dryden. They will have to ground share with Cambrian and Clydach Vale BGC because Cae Gof isn’t deemed suitable for the Ardal Leagues.

“We have got a lot of work as a club over the next 12 months,” he added. “We have got to find finances to do our ground, which we are well in the process of. We have got an asset transfer with the Bridgend County Borough Council, so we will be taking on the pavilion as well. So we have got a lot going on as a club and the promotion is the icing on the cake.”

What would really top it all off, though, is for Mr Davies to get well enough to see his beloved Cefn Cribwr play in the Ardal League South West. Because, after all, this club would quite literally be nothing without him.

“100 percent,” Dryden replied. “Absolutely. It is a little trek, it’s not around the corner, we have to travel to Cambrian in Clydach Vale, it’s a good 20 minutes or half an hour for us. It’s more likely he will see some of our away games which will be closer to Cae Gof than what Cambrian is.

“We want to be coming back to Cae Gof as an Ardal South West side playing out of Cefn Cribwr, which will be absolutely amazing.”

Read More
Related Articles
Read More
Related Articles
    • 1
    • 2
    • 3
    • 4
    • 5

Recent News

  • The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online
  • Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus
  • Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph – South Wales Guardian
  • Llandeilo School joins Jubilee performance in Albert Hall | South Wales Guardian – South Wales Guardian
  • First look at Russell Crowe in Arclight Films’ ‘Poker Face’ (exclusive) – Screen International

Categories

  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Health
  • Politics
  • Science
  • Sport
  • Popular News
  • Comments

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online

May 17, 2022

European elections: The view from your region – BBC News

May 24, 2019

European election 2019: Brexit Party tops poll in Wales – BBC News

May 27, 2019

Concert will raise money for town’s heritage railway after thieves stole £14000 – South Wales Argus

June 14, 2019

Categories

  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Health
  • Politics
  • Science
  • Sport

Don't Miss!

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online
Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus
Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph – South Wales Guardian
Llandeilo School joins Jubilee performance in Albert Hall | South Wales Guardian – South Wales Guardian
First look at Russell Crowe in Arclight Films’ ‘Poker Face’ (exclusive) – Screen International
Australian election: Where is climate change on the agenda? – Al Jazeera English

Latest News

The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online

Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus

Other News

  • The winners of every league in Welsh rugby as 191 games go unplayed in ‘s***show’ season – Wales Online
  • Woman in ‘life threatening’ condition following crash – South Wales Argus
  • Wales celebrate Emma Raducanu’s memorable US Open triumph – South Wales Guardian

Categories

  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Health
  • Politics
  • Science
  • Sport