William Delme Thomas is a former rugby union

Rugby union

Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 player who became one of Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

' best known rugby players in the 1960s and 70s. He joined Llanelli RFC

Llanelli RFC

Llanelli Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union club founded in 1875 and its senior team is one of the leading club sides in Wales. The club began the 2008-09 season at their historic home ground of Stradey Park in Llanelli, but moved in November 2008 to the new Parc y Scarlets in adjacent...

 in 1961 and was the team's captain when they won the league in the 1972-73 season and was also the captain when Llanelli famously beat a touring All Blacks team in 1972. He is remembered for his emotional speech given to his teammates before this game.

He played for the Wales national youth team at age eighteen and won his first cap against Australia

Australia national rugby union team

The Australian national rugby union team is the representative side of Australia in rugby union. The national team is nicknamed the Wallabies and competes annually with New Zealand and South Africa in the Tri-Nations Series, in which they also contest the Bledisloe Cup with New Zealand and the...

 in December 1966 and was first choice as lock for the team until he retired from international rugby in 1973. He was an important part of the team that won the Grand Slam

Grand Slam (Rugby Union)

In rugby union, a Grand Slam occurs when one team in the Six Nations Championship manages to beat all the others during one year's competition...

 in 1971. During his last season, he was Wales' captain in the game against New Zealand in Cardiff

Cardiff Arms Park

Cardiff Arms Park , also known as The Arms Park, is primarily known as a rugby union stadium, but it also has a bowling green, and is situated in the centre of Cardiff, Wales. The Arms Park was host to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1958, and hosted four games in the 1991 Rugby World...

. In total, he won 22 caps.

Delme Thomas toured three times with the then-British Lions

British and Irish Lions

The British and Irish Lions is a rugby union team made up of players from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales...

. He got his first cap in 1966, before playing for the Wales team, where he played in two test matches. He went on to play two games in the 1968 tour in South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

 and another two in New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 in 1971.

In 2000, at the National Eistedfodd in Llanelli, Thomas was honoured as a member of the Gorsedd

Gorsedd

A gorsedd plural gorseddau, is a community or coming together of modern-day bards. The word is of Welsh origin, meaning "throne". It is occasionally spelled gorsedh , or goursez in Brittany....

of the Bards, for his contribution to Welsh sport and the Welsh language.

External links

• Delme Thomas, WRU profile