Blues winger Tom Williams has replaced Ealing’s Will Harries who is unavailable due to club commitments.
Williams will be part of a Wales squad who will face hosts South Africa, USA and Kenya in Pool A.
It will be the third time on the trot Wales face hosts South Africa in pool play but team manager Steff Thomas is quietly confident his side can reach the knockout stages on Sunday.
“We find ourselves facing another tough group with host nation South Africa, Kenya and USA so it will be another exciting week where we will need to be at our best,” he said.
“We are looking to claim a scalp this week but South Africa will be buoyant after winning the title in Dubai last weekend.
“The boys have trained hard this week and hopefully we can go one better than last week and reach a semi-final. We were a little disappointed to win only one from five games in Dubai but we reached the quarter-finals which was our aim.”
Last weekend Wales scraped into the Cup quarter-finals despite winning just one of their three pool games. Wales’ campaign was stopped in its tracks by Fiji in the quarter-finals with a 31-17 defeat, but worse was to follow when Scotland romped home 31-7 in the Plate semi-final for Wales to finish on a downward curve.
“We achieved our target of a quarter-final spot but we were a little disappointed at how we performed, especially against Scotland. However this young group are keen to learn and have a quick opportunity to put the lessons learned from last week to good effect,” said Thomas.
Wales Sevens squad for South Africa
Lee Williams (Carmarthen Quins)
Tomos Williams (Cardiff Blues)
Rhodri Davies (Llandovery)
Luke Morgan (Newport Gwent Dragons)
Tom Williams (Blues)
Aled Jenkins (Ospreys)
Steffan Jones (Newport Gwent Dragons)
Lloyd Evans (Ospreys)
Sion Bennett (Scarlets)
Craig Price (Scarlets)
Jason Harries (Carmarthen Quins)
Jevon Groves (Cardiff Blues – Captain)
Round 3, HSBC Sevens World Series -South Africa
13-14 December – Port Elizabeth
