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Several of Britain’s best riders will compete in June’s Lloyds Women’s Tour of Britain, including Lizzie Deignan.

Her Lidl-Trek team-mate and Olympic silver medallist from last year’s Paris Games Anna Henderson will also take on the four stages across England and Scotland, from 5-8 June.

Also starring are two of British cycling’s brightest prospects Cat Ferguson of Movistar and Imogen Wolff, who rides for Visma-Lease a Bike.

Sisters Elynor and Zoe Backstedt also compete, for UAE-Team ADQ and Canyon-Sram Zondacrypto respectively.

Deignan, 36, is retiring at the end of this season after an illustrious career which includes twice winning the Tour of Britain Women and many of the sport’s biggest races, including the inaugural Paris-Roubaix in 2021 and a silver medal at the London 2012 Olympics.

“I have such special memories from this race and over my career I have had a lot of success here,” said Deignan, who won in 2016 and 2019.

“This will be my final Tour of Britain so it will be bittersweet but I am going to be surrounded by some incredible women.”

The UCI World Tour race sees a peloton of world-class riders – including peerless sprinter Lorena Wiebes of the Netherlands – take on stages in the north east of England, including Hartlepool, and in Scotland, finishing in Glasgow.

Ferguson won last year’s junior UCI Road World Championships in Switzerland, and is seen as one of the best young talents on the Women’s World Tour.

The 19-year-old won last week’s Navarra Women’s Elite Classic one-day race while Wolff, also 19, won stage three and the young rider’s white jersey at the Vuelta a Extremadura Femenina in March.

The Tour of Britain Women was rescued by British Cycling last year after being cancelled in 2023 because of funding issues.

The race is known for being one of the few races which pays equal prize money – relative the number of stages – to the men’s event.

Stage one: Thursday 5 June, Dalby Forest to Redcar

Stage two: Friday 6 June, Hartlepool to Saltburn-by-the-Sea

Stage three: Saturday 7 June, The Scottish Borders Stage, Kelso to Kelso

Interim boss Matt Sherratt is hoping a Test win in Japan in July will ensure Wales’ new permanent head coach is not saddled by the squad’s record losing streak.

Wales ended their Six Nations campaign in March with a record 68-14 home loss to England that represented a 17th successive Test defeat.

Sherratt will again fill the caretaker role he adopted during the Six Nations and lead Wales against Japan in Kitakyushu on 5 July and Kobe seven days later.

He will return to Cardiff and make way for the new appointment, but says victory and not development is what matters against Eddie Jones’ Japan.

“Probably a big part of doing it when I was asked a couple of weeks ago, was laying a foundation for the next guy coming in.

“I don’t think it’s our job as coaches to look at the big picture. We’ll be in camp for six or seven weeks and it’s a short tour.

“With the world rankings and Japan being one place behind, it’s about going there and trying to get a result.”

The last time Wales tasted victory was against Georgia in October 2023, and that losing run has seen the team slip to a record low of 12th in the world rankings.

New Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) director of rugby Dave Reddin is leading the search for a new permanent head coach to replace Warren Gatland, who resigned in February.

“I would love for the next guy to look at the team, think there’s something to build on and not have that losing record around their neck,” Sherratt added.

Players will start preparing for Wales’ tour next week amid the backdrop of the latest crisis to hit Welsh rugby between the WRU and its professional sides, with Ospreys and Scarlets in a dispute with the governing body about unequal funding proposals.

The WRU made the announcement it was reverting to a two-tier funding model amid reports it intends to cut a professional team, although it has neither confirmed nor denied if reducing the amount of sides from four to three is part of its plans.

Sherratt says this recent turmoil had not deterred him from again accepting the caretaker role after he had taken charge for the final three games of the Six Nations.

“I’ve been in this job long enough, I just concentrate on the rugby,” said Sherratt. “I love coaching, that’s my motivation.

“I’ll let other people who are way above my pay grade worry about the future of the regions and the national game.

“It’s probably bigger news outside of an environment than it is inside. I’m sure in the background, after the tour, that may be an issue.

There is more harmony between the coaches with Sherratt saying he sought advice from the other regional Wales bosses when selecting the squad, even sounding out some to join his backroom team.

“I thought it was important I spoke to the WRU about having some other regional coaches involved, but unfortunately they were not all able to do it for various reasons,” said Sherratt.

“They’ve been involved, not directly, with selection and been more than helpful to me.”

The 33-man squad Sherratt came up with includes Ospreys hooker Dewi Lake as captain with Jac Morgan away with the British and Irish Lions.

There are six uncapped players in Keelan Giles, Macs Page, Reuben Morgan-Williams, Liam Belcher, Chris Coleman and Garyn Phillips.

Exeter captain Dafydd Jenkins will undergo surgery and misses out, along with Scarlets prop Henry Thomas, who the WRU says will seek specialist opinion on a long-term condition, while Gloucester centre Max Llewellyn is also injured.

Locks Adam Beard and Will Rowlands have been rested, while notable absentees from the squad includes Gloucester fly-half Gareth Anscombe, Saracens centre Nick Tompkins, Scarlets wing Ellis Mee and Cardiff flanker James Botham with uncapped Ospreys number eight also missing out.

Sherratt will have a new team of assistant coaches alongside him in Harlequins head coach Danny Wilson and the Premiership club’s scrum specialist Adam Jones, in addition to Gloucester’s Rhys Thomas and former Wales prop Gethin Jenkins.

Jones and Thomas worked alongside Sherratt during the Six Nations and – together with interim forwards coach Wilson – are on secondment from their Premiership clubs, while defence coach Jenkins has been released by WRU-owned Cardiff.

“There’s a big change happening at the moment with the system,” said Sherratt.

“The WRU were clear they wanted to take an interim staff. As soon as they said that, it was important – with the limited time – that we’d worked together before.

“It’s a familiar staff. Having staff harmony rubs off on the players. It’s important I had people I know and trust.”

Wales will consider adding a kicking coach at a later date, with Leigh Halfpenny linked with a role that Neil Jenkins has filled for almost 20 years.

Jonathan Humphreys and Mike Forshaw, who were part of Gatland’s coaching staff throughout his second spell in charge, will not be involved this summer, while Rob Howley and Alex King are also again missing.

No detail have been provided about their futures, with Sherratt saying their fate will be decided by others.

“That’s for the next coach to make that decision, as well as the top of the WRU,” Sherratt added.

An emotional Ange Postecoglou angrily refuted the suggestion he is a “clown” in a combative news conference on the eve of Tottenham’s Europa League final against Manchester United.

Referencing a report in the Standard which said he was “teetering between hero and clown” depending on the result in Bilbao, Spurs boss Postecoglou defended his managerial record despite his side’s poor domestic season.

In Wednesday’s final, Tottenham will either end a 17-year wait for a trophy or finish the campaign empty-handed again, on the back of their worst campaign since the club returned to the top flight in 1978.

Speaking at San Mames Stadium, Postecoglou veered from simmering discontent to his voice cracking with emotion as he recounted his personal journey and that of his family.

He brought the conversation back to the article when the reporter who wrote it pointed out this season could become one of the best or worst in the club’s “modern history” and the Australian was veering a fine line “between two very different types of infamy”.

“Irrespective of tomorrow, I’m not a clown and never will be,” said Postecoglou.

“You really disappointed me that you used such terminology to describe a person that for 26 years, without any favours from anyone, has worked his way to a position where he is leading out a club in a European final.

Postecoglou was born in Athens but emigrated to Australia with his family when he was five.

After winning four international caps as a player, he embarked on a stellar coaching career that included spells with Brisbane Roar and Melbourne Victory, before taking over the Australia national side.

He moved on to Japan with Yokohama F Marinos, then joined Celtic in 2021 and Tottenham in 2023.

Postecoglou evidently feels, regardless of whether Tottenham win or not tomorrow, he is a success story given where he has come from.

“My parents left everything they knew because of their children, because of me, I hold that dear to my heart,” he added.

“I was born in Greece. My father made sure I knew what it means to be Greek. Then I grew up in Australia, where football is not a prominent sport.

Postecoglou has spent months batting away questions about his future.

He generally dismisses the impact of losing his job, preferring to concentrate on his players and the task immediately ahead of them.

On Tuesday evening in Bilbao, he took a different approach, telling a room full of journalists he will be fine, no matter what the outcome for his team.

“Don’t stress,” he said. “I have been in this position before where a big game has been the last one I have managed.

“I qualified for a World Cup with Australia and left, won at Celtic and left, won at Brisbane and left. It does happen.

“My future is assured. I have a great family and a great life. Provided my health remains and my family is there my future is assured.

“I still think there is a lot of work to be done [at Tottenham]. There has been some growth I would like to see through.

Immediately before his manager spoke to the media, Tottenham captain Son Heung-min had done so alongside full-back Pedro Porro.

Along with Ben Davies, Son is the remaining link to the team beaten by Liverpool in the 2019 Champions League final.

That loss still stings, judging by Son’s “I still don’t think it was a penalty” response to a question about the game, referring to the contentious first-minute spot-kick for handball against Moussa Sissoko that offered Liverpool a chance to establish a lead they never seriously looked like losing.

Son’s participation in Wednesday’s final had been in doubt due to a foot injury that kept him out for a month prior to the home defeat by Crystal Palace on 11 May.

But, during Tuesday evening’s open training session, Postecoglou appeared to indicate the 32-year-old would start as he operated a three-man attack that also included Brennan Johnson and Wilson Odobert in the number 10 role behind striker Dominic Solanke.