UPDATED: Reffell out, Morgan in at openside - Wales forced into late change against Portugal

Wales head coach Warren Gatland has been forced into a late change to the Wales team to face Portugal in Stade de Nice on Saturday, 16 September, with Jac Morgan replacing Tommy Reffell at openside flanker.  

1 Nicky Smith
2 Dewi Lake (c)
3 Dillon Lewis
4 Christ Tshiunza
5 Dafydd Jenkins
6 Dan Lydiate
7 Jac Morgan
8 Taulupe Faletau
9 Tomos Williams
10 Gareth Anscombe 
11 Rio Dyer 
12 Johnny Williams
13 Mason Grady
14 Louis Rees-Zammit
15 Leigh Halfpenny

Replacements:

16 Ryan Elias
17 Corey Domachowski
18 Tomas Francis
19 Adam Beard
20 Taine Basham
21 Gareth Davies
22 Sam Costelow
23 Josh Adams 

Wales made one change on-arrival: Tommy Reffell is replaced by Jac Morgan at the flanker.

• Head coach Warren Gatland has made 13 changes to his starting XV following their six-point victory over Fiji with only Taulupe Falatau and Louis Rees-Zammit retaining their places in the run-on side. Four players in the starting XV will be making their RWC debut.
  
• Dewi Lake has been named captain for only the second time in his career. He led Wales against England at Twickenham in the RWC 2023 warm-up test. This will be only the third start of his career, with seven of his past nine caps earned off the bench.
  
• Leigh Halfpenny will play his third Rugby World Cup after 2011 and 2019. He has played only 15 of Wales’ 43 tests since the start of 2020, including just 165 minutes across three appearances in 2023. At age 34 years, eight months and 26 days, he becomes the oldest backline player to play a Rugby World Cup game for Wales, surpassing Shane Williams who was 34 years, seven months and 26 days against the Wallabies in Auckland.
  
• This will be the first time since 26 November, 2022 against Australia that Gareth Anscombe and Tomos Williams have started alongside each other at scrum-half and fly-half, and only the fifth time overall.
  
• Tomos Williams will earn his 50th test cap for Wales after making his debut against South Africa in 2018, becoming the seventh Welsh scrum-half to reach this milestone.
  
• This will be the first time Exeter Chiefs team-mates Christ Tshiunza and Dafydd Jenkins start a test alongside each other in the second row for Wales. Tshiunza is also making his first test start in the second row.