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Wales international scrum-half Tomos Williams is to leave Gloucester at the end of the season.

Williams has been a stand-out player for the Cherry and Whites since signing in 2024 and was named Premiership Player of the Season in June and Gloucester captain this term.

However a club statement confirmed this season will be his last at Kingsholm.

“Tomos Williams will depart Gloucester Rugby at the end of the 2025/26 season,” it read.

“After impressing at Kingsholm, Williams was offered a new deal to stay at the club beyond the end of the season, but has instead opted to pursue a new challenge elsewhere.

“The Welshman will depart with the best wishes of everyone at the club when the time comes, but in the meantime, is entirely dedicated to ending his time at Gloucester Rugby on a high.”

The 30-year-old, who has been heavily linked with a move to Prem rivals Saracens, has been capped 69 times for Wales.

He was selected for this summer’s British and Irish Lions tour, but having impressed in a pre-tour warm-up match against Argentina, he was forced to return home after suffering a hamstring injury in the first game on Australian soil against Western Force, having scored two tries.

Gloucester confirmed on Monday the signings of his Wales team-mates Jac Morgan and Dewi Lake from Ospreys for next season.

The club have also announced that former academy graduate Dan Robson, 33, is to return to Kingsholm next season, 10 years on from his departure in 2015.

Newcastle United head coach Eddie Howe says it is a “horrible feeling” to not know what he is going to get from his side.

Howe thought Newcastle had “turned a corner” with a win against Manchester City in November and a more recent four-game unbeaten run, but Sunday’s damaging 1-0 defeat against arch-rivals Sunderland has been a jolt to the system.

Newcastle put in a limp performance after Howe sent out his team to be compact rather than bold at the Stadium of Light.

They now sit 12th in the Premier League table, having won just one away league game since mid-April, and Howe cut a frustrated figure as he assessed his team’s inconsistency a few days on.

“It’s a horrible feeling, because when you enter a game you want your players to go on to the pitch and give absolutely everything they have within their soul and their body to get a positive result,” Howe said on Tuesday.

“That’s the only thing I ever ask a player to do. Then I back their abilities once they go on to the pitch with that mindset to deliver a really good performance.

“There have been a few times this season where I’ve left a game unsure on that, and that’s mentality. That’s knowing you’re representing yourself and your families when you enter the pitch.

Using the disappointment of a painful away defeat to bounce back has become a recurring theme for Newcastle this season, following losses against Brentford, West Ham and Marseille in the last couple of months, and Howe said that is not how he wants his team to be operating.

But Newcastle have to quickly rally once again when Howe’s trophy holders meet Fulham in the quarter-finals of the Carabao Cup at St James’ Park on Wednesday.

Captain Bruno Guimaraes recognised that Newcastle won’t be able to truly “set things right”, until the next Tyne-Wear derby in March, having labelled his side’s weekend performance a “mess”.

Howe said that talking off the pitch was “important”, but the head coach stressed it “pales in significance against your will to prepare”.

“Bruno’s comments were 90% right, initially,” Howe said. “I don’t think we were a mess. I don’t think the other parts of his original comments were wrong.

“We weren’t a mess – we were very well organised. We just didn’t deliver the performance that we wanted to.

“Bruno is very emotional and that’s part of his success. That’s why he’s such an outstanding player for us and leader for us.

“It’s making sure our messaging is right to the outside world. The mindset now is we can’t affect the past – we can only affect the future. We need to do that today.”

Tottenham defender Micky van de Ven said he “never expected” the club to sack former manager Ange Postecoglou.

The Australian’s two-year tenure came to an end just 16 days after he led Tottenham to victory in the Europa League final – the club’s first major trophy for 17 years.

However, the club’s European success was not mirrored in the Premier League, with Tottenham finishing in 17th place in Postecoglou’s final season in charge.

He was replaced by former Brentford boss Thomas Frank in the summer but Spurs currently sit 11th in the table, with 22 points from 16 matches, and suffered a 3-0 loss to Nottingham Forest on Sunday.

“He was a really good manager. I still really like him,” Van de Ven told The Overlap podcast.

“I don’t know how everything went backstage. I didn’t expect it. It was strange how everything went after – he’s the manager that won silverware for Tottenham.

Postecoglou joined Tottenham from Celtic ahead of the 2023-24 season, replacing Antonio Conte, and enjoyed early success with his attacking style of play, taking 26 points from his opening 10 league matches.

However, that unbeaten run came to an abrupt end with four defeats in five matches and Tottenham’s season tailed off, ultimately missing out on Champions League qualification by two points.

The following season, they won just 11 of their 38 league matches.

Although he enjoyed Postecoglou’s style of play, Netherlands international Van de Ven believes Tottenham lacked a “plan B” and revealed he and Cristian Romero discussed taking a more defensive approach with the manager.

“I liked the offensive play [under Postecoglou] but I like what we have now with Thomas Frank. We are more secure at the back. I don’t like getting exposed every game on the counter-attack,” he said.

“At the beginning [under Postecoglou], no team was used to playing against our system. We were playing unbelievable football.

“But managers analyse everything and people knew what we were doing. Sometimes we didn’t really have a plan B and we were getting exposed. We didn’t have solutions to get out.

Brighton have apologised after plans to remove a tribute wall at Amex Stadium were criticised by fans.

The club announced plans to remove their Heritage Tile Wall, which contains more than 2,500 tiles paid for by fans, after saying it was “falling foul of time and weather conditions”.

Brighton intended to replace it with a virtual ‘Fan Wall’ – which fans could upload a photo on to for £45 – to celebrate their 125th anniversary.

“We are aware that the club’s decision to find a new format to recreate and preserve the messages on the heritage tiles has caused distress to some fans and confusion for others. We are very sorry for this,” Barber wrote in a letter to fans.

“We are fully aware that many tiles represent significant sentimental and emotional moments and connections in people’s lives, hence our desire to protect and preserve the messages.

“In looking at all new options, we have listened very carefully to the heartfelt feedback we have received in the past few days and we will not merge the heritage messages with the new 125 wall as originally proposed.”

Brighton aim to have the new installation in place during the 2026-27 season, and have said that all current messages on tiles will be transferred for free.