Tonight's rugby news as date announced for huge Cardiff final and Wales to host new Test series

These are your evening rugby headlines on Wednesday, June 12.

Date confirmed for huge Cardiff final

The dates for next season's European finals in Cardiff have been confirmed.

After the Principality Stadium was confirmed as the venue for next year's finals weekend, it has been confirmed that the Challenge Cup final will be played on Friday, May 23 2025, with the Champions Cup final taking place the folowwing day.

It will be the eighth time that the Champions Cup decider will have been played in the Welsh capital, with the last time coming back in 2015. Next year's event will also be the 30th edition of the elite final.

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It will also be the third Challenge Cup final to have been held in Cardiff.

The pool draws for both the Challenge and Champions Cup will also be held in Cardiff on Tuesday, July 2. The draw for the Challenge Cup pools will start at 11am and will be followed at approximately 11.20am by the draw for the Champions Cup pools.

Wales to host Test series

Wales will stage an inaugural women's U20 Test series in Cardiff next month.

The transatlantic series will involve sides from Wales, Canada, England and the USA, with the four nations facing each other over a two week period. It follows Wales' tour of Canada last summer, when they also faced the USA.

Wales will play their first match of the series against the USA at Cardiff Arms park on July 19, before hosting Canada at the same venue five days later.

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“We look forward to hosting Canada and the USA from the across the Atlantic and, of course, our near neighbours England for what will be an exciting tournament to showcase the exciting young talent all four nations have in the women’s game," said Wales U20s head coach Liza Burgess.

“England, Canada and USA are the benchmark teams in our game, and we know these Test matches will be a real marker of where we are as a squad. We played the USA and Canada last summer and that proved to be a real stepping stone for players, like Nel Metcalfe, Sian Jones, Gwennan Hopkins and Molly Reardon, who all went on to make their Wales debuts in the recent Six Nations campaign.

“We returned home with a played one and won one record, but the experience proved to be invaluable for the players, coaches and staff and we look forward to giving all three teams a warm welcome," she added. “The Transatlantic Quad Series will follow on from the U20s Six Nations in Parma early in July, so this will prove a tough and demanding month for the players and will be a test of our resilience, but it is a challenge we are excited about.

"We know we are going to learn a lot about the players and these games also provide an excellent opportunity for those players transitioning up this year from U18s.”

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Scotland name squad as Russell rested

By Anthony Brown, PA

Sale scrum-half Gus Warr is among 10 uncapped players named in Gregor Townsend's 37-man Scotland squad for the summer tour of the Americas.

Nathan McBeth, Patrick Harrison, Robbie Smith, Will Hurd, Max Williamson, Ewan Johnson, Gregor Brown, Arron Reed and Matt Currie are the others who could make their debuts in matches against Canada, USA, Chile and Uruguay next month.

Zander Fagerson, Grant Gilchrist, Richie Gray, Finn Russell, Jack Dempsey and Darcy Graham are among the senior players who have been left out, along with France-based pair Ben White and Blair Kinghorn and the Japan-bound George Turner. However, Duhan van der Merwe, Matt Fagerson, Huw Jones, Pierre Schoeman, Jamie Ritchie, Rory Darge, Kyle Steyn, Scott Cummings and Sione Tuipulotu have all been selected, ensuring an experienced core remains within a largely experimental group.

Despite the lack of experienced hookers available to Townsend at present, Glasgow front-rower Johnny Matthews - who made his debut at the World Cup - is a notable omission at the end of a season in which he finished top try-scorer in the regulation United Rugby Championship.

Edinburgh's Paddy Harrison and Northampton's Robbie Smith are the two main alternative options at hooker to the more senior Ewan Ashman. Glasgow-bound stand-off Adam Hastings, who won his last cap in November 2022, is back in the mix and will compete for the number 10 jersey with Ben Healy and Ross Thompson in the absence of talisman Russell, who has been given the summer off.

During the last two weeks of the tour, three development players will join the squad "as a learning opportunity and to bolster training". Tighthead Fin Richardson, who has signed for Glasgow next season, will be joined by Warriors scrum-half Ben Afshar and Edinburgh lock Rob Carmichael.

England star sheds a stone ahead of debut

By Duncan Bech, PA England Rugby Correspondent

Ollie Sleightholme is operating at his ideal playing weight after discovering the bulking up programme that turned his Northampton team-mates into Gallagher Premiership champions took the edge off his own game.

Sleightholme is aiming to win his first England cap on the upcoming tour to Japan and New Zealand to cap a stellar season that produced a domestic title and the personal triumph of emerging as the league's top try-scorer.

But the turbo-charged wing's success only came after realising that adding muscle was not having the same impact on him as it was for other members of Saints' backline, who became stronger in contact with the extra kilos.

"There's a fine line between being too big and being in a good spot," said the 24-year-old, son of former Northampton and England wing Jon. "At the start of the season I was a bit too bulked up and it was during the season that I found where I needed to sit with my body and then I got into a rhythm after that.

"I had put on eight kilos - I went from 90 kilos to 98 kilos in four-and-a-half or five weeks. It was just loads of gym and loads of eating, basically. I got to the end of it and the strength and conditioning coaches said 'well done for doing it', and I was like 'I can't play this heavy, it's not going to work'.

"The turning is the difficult bit. When you're a bit heavier, turning and moving and changing direction is when you feel it. Running in a straight line isn't too bad because once the weight's moving, it's moving. But changing direction and reacting to stuff was difficult when I was heavier.

"So it became a case of starting to get back into training and it all sort of drops off as you start training and playing. I'm now somewhere around 92 kilos, so just a couple of kilos heavier than where I was. A weight of 92/93 is probably where I want to be."