Cox treble puts Wales into 2025 World Cup

By ROGER PANTING

Wales……………..52pts

Tries: Callender 3, Fleming 12, Butchers 35, 55, Cox 46, 64, 77, Hesketh 71

Conversions: Bevan 3, 12, 35, 46, 55, George 77

Spain ……………… 20pts

Tries: Antolinez 26, Pena 30, C Peerez 37

Conversions: Argudo 26

Penalties: Argudo 22

Wales put their Six Nations’ woes firmly behind them to secure a place in the 2025 World Cup with an eight-try thrashing of Spain.

By finishing bottom in the Six Nations they were required to undertake this qualifying game and a defeat would have seen them embarrassingly demoted to the third tier where they would have been up against the likes of Netherlands and Madagascar.

Despite having forward dominance throughout with Alisha Butcher and Sisilia Tuipulotu to the fore, they were only a point ahead at half-time as Spain enjoyed a purple patch scoring 15 points in the absence of the sin-binned Carys Cox.

However it was a totally different story after the interval as Wales scored 32 unanswered points with Cox fully atoning for her error with a hat-trick of tries.

Welsh captain, Hannah Jones, said: “I’m relieved as the weather suited them and we knew that we had to break them down in the first 20 minutes.

“The forwards built us a superb platform and we were able to show what we could do by scoring some excellent tries.”

Wales were quickly out of the traps to take an early lead. Strong bursts from props, Gwenilian Prys and Tuipulotu, softened up the defence before Alex Callender took an inside pass to score.

The hosts soon had a second when Kerin Lake celebrated her 50th cap with a powerful run to set up a try for Abbie Fleming.

However a couple of handling errors from Carys Phillips restricted Wales’ momentum and they suffered a further blow when Cox was yellow-carded for a deliberate knock-on with Amalia Argudo kicking the resulting penalty.

It proved to be a disastrous sin-bin period for Wales as Las Leonas scored two tries in the wing’s absence with Ines Antolinez and Claudia Pena both crossing.

Normal service was resumed when Cox returned in time to see Butchers drove over from close range but Spain were now a different side and immediately responded with a well-created try from Claudia Perez to leave them trailing 21-20 at the interval.

Cox began the second half rout by skipping past a weak tackle from Argudo to put daylight between the teams before Butchers added her second.

Wales were now in total control and saved the best till last with both Cox and Jenny Hesketh finishing off flowing moves before a well-judged cross-field kick from Robyn Wilkins presented Cox with her hat-trick.