Coach Warren Gatland hailed his squad of young guns on Sunday after they blasted their way into the Rugby World Cup quarter-finals with another impressive display.
Nineteen-year-old winger George North and Sam Warburton, the World Cup’s youngest ever captain at 22, led the charge as both bagged tries alongside a double for centre Jamie Roberts, 24, in a 66-0 rout of Fiji.
Leigh Halfpenny, Jonathan Davies, Scott Williams and Lloyd Williams, who are all in their early 20s, were also among the nine try-scorers while Rhys Priestland, 24, enjoyed a flawless kicking night of five conversions and one penalty.
The young brigade have spurred Wales to three wins and a 17-16 loss to reigning champions South Africa as they escaped the ‘Pool of Death’ with room to spare.
“It’s been fantastic, the depth that we’re starting to develop in the squad, but we knew before we came how hard the players had worked,” Gatland said.
“There’s some fantastic youngsters who are really making a name for themselves.
“We arrived in New Zealand with no one knowing anything about some of the youngsters and I’d like to think one or two of them have made a little bit of an impression since they’ve arrived.”
Assistant coach Rob Howley had special praise for North, who was instrumental in three of their tries and finished off a ball-juggling move down the right for a score of his own.
“He’s a young talent. We look at our wingers’ work rate off the ball and both him and Leigh Halfpenny worked extremely hard,” said Howley.
Skipper Warburton said confidence was high in the Wales camp after consecutive wins against Samoa, Namibia and Fiji as they head into the quarter-finals with no serious injury problems.
“The word ‘ruthless’ has been drilled into the boys for the last few weeks. I think that was the next step for us — not to take our foot off the gas when we were doing well,” Warburton said.
“Everyone’s very confident. Coming into this pool a lot of people might have said we’d find it tough to come out, but I think we’ve done very well over the last few games and we take that confidence into the quarter-finals.”
Wales are now into their third World Cup quarter-final.
“I feel like the squad’s in pretty good shape at the moment,” Gatland said.
“We felt that coming out of a tough pool, like South Africa at the last World Cup, does potentially set you up for a quarter-final and maybe a little bit further.”
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