The whole squad will be in attendance for a night that will see Wales’ top regional side play four 20 minute games in a row against the Premier clubs in their region, Aberavon, Bridgend, Neath and Swansea.
“It’s a great concept that will, I’m sure, be a big hit with supporters of the Ospreys and the four clubs taking part. To bring the four teams, the Ospreys, and supporters of all five teams to one venue for an evening of rugby is something that has never been done before,” said Ospreys chief executive Andrew Hore.
“Off the field, the full squad will be in attendance to help make it a memorable night for everybody. The Gnoll holds great memories for all Ospreys supporters and, hopefully, this event will create new memories for a new generation.”
The Ospreys have selected a squad of 26 players which will be led by summer signing Martin Roberts, who has returned to Wales from Bath. Wales wing Dafydd Howells will play against the Premierships club to which he is attached, Neath, while Wales Under 20 front rowers Scott Otten and Nicky Thomas will get a chance to shine during the night.
“It’s going to be a real challenge for the squad because the format is something they won’t have experienced before with all four clubs lining up to get one over them. We should learn a lot about the character of this young team,” said Ospreys head coach Steve Tandy.
“It will be tough physically as every 20 minutes there’ll be a fresh team coming on to the field for them to contend with. It’s another building block of pre-season, as was last Friday in Worcester and Thursday night against Saracens will be.
“It was a mixed bag on Friday night – there were things to be pleased with and things that we weren’t happy about. But it’s all about building towards the first game of the PRO12 season against Treviso at the Liberty.
“There are plenty of lessons to take from the Worcester match, but nobody is pressing a panic button because we lost a pre-season game. We never want to lose a match as Ospreys, but we’ve been around a while now and understand that there is a bigger picture.
“We’re looking at getting a big group of players up to speed, players who have come back at different times and are following different conditioning programmes, and giving people a chance to show what they can do. What’s important is that we use these games to find out more about what we’ve got in the locker.
“We’re in the middle of a busy week with three games in total and and everyone is getting their heads down and working hard. After Thursday night there’s a week of fine tuning and we’ll be ready to go in front of our own fans against Treviso on day one.”
OSPREYS
15 Ross Jones
14 Dafydd Howells
13 Aled Jenkins
12 Ben John
11 Aisea Natoga
10 Sam Davies
9 Martin Roberts (Capt)
1 Gareth Thomas
2 Matthew Dwyer
3 Daniel Suter
4 Adam Beard
5 Rory Thornton
6 Olly Cracknell
7 Lloyd Evans
8 Morgan Allen
REPLACEMENTS
16 Scott Otten
17 Marc Thomas
18 Nicky Thomas
19 Adam Williams
20 Jordan Collier
21 Hanno Dirksen
22 Joel Matavesi
23 Matthew Jenkins
24 Ashley Evans
25 Jake Cole
26 Tom Sloane
Supporters attending can purchases tickets at the gate on Tuesday night priced just £5 for adults, £2 concessions.
