Owen Lane and Rhys Carré have been handed their first Wales call-ups as Warren Gatland names seven Cardiff Blues in his World Cup training squad.
The Cardiff-born duo are the only uncapped players named in the 42-man squad, which will begin training in mid-June.
Dillon Lewis, Josh Navidi, Tomos Williams, Gareth Anscombe and Jarrod Evans also hold onto their places following the Six Nations.
While Carré and Anscombe will depart Cardiff Blues in the summer, two new recruits – Josh Adams (Worcester Warriors) and Hallam Amos (Dragons) are included.
“It is exciting to name our training squad and to get the RWC ball rolling,” said Wales head coach Warren Gatland.
“We’ve named a 42-man squad, packed with experience, a good number of the Grand Slam winning squad are in there plus some players who have returned from injury.
“The last couple of years have been about building depth and exposing players and we have done that well so we have kept the numbers down to make the squad as manageable as possible.
“We have created some great competition in the squad and there are a couple of players on the injury list at the moment that we could add into the squad at a later date depending on their recovery.
“We have been really impressed with Rhys (Carre) and with Owen (Lane). They have both been on our succession plan for a while and it will be good to have them in camp with us and to see what they are able to do.
“We are looking forward to the squad meeting up and a hard summer of work ahead of us. We have planned it meticulously and the plans have been in place for a good while now. Looking back to 2011 and 2015 we were happy with our preparation so we are hoping to take that into this year and hopefully build on it.”
Thirty-six of Wales’ 2019 Grand Slam squad are named in the training squad which is made up of 23 forwards and 19 backs.
The players will link up with Wales on a rolling start, after each has received four weeks off following their final club/regional game.
Preparations will begin at the state-of-the-art WRU National Centre of Excellence with the whole squad expected in camp by the middle to end of June.
The rigorous schedule will prepare the squad for their first overseas training camp in the Swiss Alps. As per 2015, the squad will head to Fiesch in Switzerland for an intensive fortnight. They will ‘live high’ and ‘train low’ in the resort then return to Cardiff for more preparation ahead of back-to-back fixtures against England at Twickenham (August 11) and Principality Stadium respectively (August 17).
The morning after their second clash with England the squad will head to the heat of Turkey for warm-weather training in the purpose built Gloria Sports Arena before flying home for their final two preparation matches. Wales will face Ireland in Cardiff on August 31st and announce their 31-man RWC squad the following week. They then face the return fixture in Dublin on September 7.
WALES’ 2019 RWC TRAINING SQUAD:
FORWARDS (23):
Leon Brown (Dragons) (5 Caps)
Rhys Carre (Cardiff Blues) (*Uncapped)
Rob Evans (Scarlets) (35 Caps)
Tomas Francis (Exeter Chiefs) (40 Caps)
Wyn Jones (Scarlets) (12 Caps)
Samson Lee (Scarlets) (40 Caps)
Dillon Lewis (Cardiff Blues) (12 Caps)
Nicky Smith (Ospreys) (28 Caps)
Elliot Dee (Dragons) (18 Caps)
Ryan Elias (Scarlets) (7 Caps)
Ken Owens (Scarlets) (64 Caps)
Jake Ball (Scarlets) (32 Caps)
Adam Beard (Ospreys) (13 Caps)
Bradley Davies (Ospreys) (64 Caps)
Cory Hill (Dragons) (24 Caps)
Alun Wyn Jones (Ospreys) (125 Caps)
James Davies (Scarlets) (3 Caps)
Taulupe Faletau (Bath) (72 Caps)
Ross Moriarty (Dragons) (31 Caps)
Josh Navidi (Cardiff Blues) (16 Caps)
Aaron Shingler (Scarlets) (17 Caps)
Justin Tipuric (Ospreys) (64 Caps)
Aaron Wainwright (Dragons) (8 Caps)
BACKS (19):
Aled Davies (Ospreys) (16 Caps)
Gareth Davies (Scarlets) (41 Caps)
Tomos Williams (Cardiff Blues) (7 Caps)
Gareth Anscombe (Cardiff Blues) (26 Caps)
Dan Biggar (Northampton Saints) (70 Caps)
Jarrod Evans (Cardiff Blues) (1 Cap)
Rhys Patchell (Scarlets) (11 Caps)
Jonathan Davies (Scarlets) (73 Caps)
Hadleigh Parkes (Scarlets) (15 Caps)
Owen Watkin (Ospreys) (13 Caps)
Scott Williams (Ospreys) (57 Caps)
Josh Adams (Worcester Warriors) (10 Caps)
Hallam Amos (Dragons) (18 Caps)
Steff Evans (Scarlets) (12 Caps)
Leigh Halfpenny (Scarlets) (81 Caps)
Owen Lane (Cardiff Blues) (*Uncapped)