Devereux available if Wales want him

Wales could have John Devereux or Paul Moriarty in their side for the quarterfinals of the World Cup next weekend. The Welsh are preparing for tomorrow's match against New Zealand at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff knowing that they are the only home nation to have already qualified for the next stage of the tournament.

Wales could have John Devereux or Paul Moriarty in their side for the quarterfinals of the World Cup next weekend. The Welsh are preparing for tomorrow's match against New Zealand at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff knowing that they are the only home nation to have already qualified for the next stage of the tournament.

In an extra boost, they have now had permission from Bridgend to bring Devereux back into rugby league on a temporary basis and were hoping last night to get the same deal with Swansea for Moriarty.

The only snag is that Wales have room in their squad for only one of the former Widnes players, because they have not yet brought in a replacement for the injured Karle Hammond.

Unless they lose another player to injury, the Welsh coach, Clive Griffiths, will have a difficult decision to make. "Either of them would give us a great boost," he said. "They have both been there and done it and would give us an extra edge, but it is in the forwards where we have injuries."

Wales have doubts over Gareth Carvell and Justin Morgan for tomorrow and could also rest Kris Tassell from the centres. The roof is to be kept closed for both the curtain-raiser between the Cook Islands and the Lebanon and the main event - something that was welcomed by Griffiths. "It will be the first time we have been dry, either training or playing," he said.

Meanwhile, the Welsh team manager, Mike Nicholas, has attacked the World Cup organisers' ticketing arrangements for Thursday's sparsely attended match against the Lebanese at Llanelli. "The crowd was embarrassing," he said.

The British Isles' other hot prospects for the quarter-finals, Ireland, will clinch their place if they beat Samoa in Dublin. They will give Tommy Martyn and Michael Egar as long as possible to recover from knocks before ruling them out.

If Ireland win and Scotland beat the Maori by enough, then the Scots could sneak through in second place, to face the daunting prospect of meeting Australia in the quarter-finals.

The world champions are widely expected to set a new international points scoring record against Russia at The Boulevard tonight. The record now stands at the 110 England scored against the USA in a warm-up game two weeks ago, but it would be no great surprise if it margin of victory proves short-lived.

Australia field a full-strength pack at Hull, but their regular kicker, Mat Rogers, is denied a stab at a new individual points record by the selection of Wendell Sailor and Jason Croker on the wings.

In Group Three, the hosts, France, can move closer to qualification by beating South Africa in Albi tomorrow, but the final positions will not be resolved until the leaders, Papua New Guinea, meet Tonga in Perpignan on Monday.