Taine Plumtree called into Wales squad

The uncapped Taine Plumtree, who Scarlets last week unveiled as a new signing, has been called up to the Wales senior men’s squad.

Swansea-born Plumtree (23) met up with his Wales team mates at Heathrow airport on Monday to travel to Switzerland for a two-week training camp. The squad arrived at its base in Fiesch last night.

Head coach Warren Gatland said: “We’ve called up Taine Plumtree to the squad to give him an opportunity. I spoke to Taine about three weeks ago about the possibility; he was in discussions with the Scarlets about signing for them. He seemed pretty excited. He’s born in Swansea, has come through the New Zealand system and is also eligible for South Africa as well with a South African mum.

“For us, given that we’ve had Josh Macleod pull out of the squad due to injury, some players unavailable and Taulupe Faletau has picked up a bit of an injury, we thought it was a great opportunity for Taine to come in. He’s a six foot five back-row forward, we don’t have a lot of those here in Wales.

“He’s 23, whether he makes the world cup squad or not he’s definitely a player we want to keep in mind for the future. Potentially that’s later down the track with the Six Nations, but he gets a chance to come in and we just know how excited he is to get the opportunity to come in and take that chance with us out in Switzerland.”

Following the training camp in Switzerland the squad will have a few days off before reconvening for a training camp in Turkey running July 23-31.