The Most Popular Sports in Wales

For many years, Rugby was the number one sport in Wales, but this has recently shifted with more sports fans taking an interest in football. There are several reasons for this, including the relative success of the men's international team and the emergence of world-class talents.

Qualification for Euro 2016 and 2020, as well as their first World Cup qualification since 1958 in 2022 saw the team gain a massive following. Head coach Craig Bellamy is also hopeful of qualification to the 2026 tournament after being drawn into a qualifying group with Belgium, Liechtenstein, Kazakhstan, and North Macedonia.

While Belgium will be the favourite to win the group, runners-up in the group stage will qualify for the playoffs to make it to the tournament. Hopefully, Wales fans can find odds of around 500/1 for the team to pull off a massive shock by winning the tournament.

In order to find the best odds for upcoming games, you should look for gambling sites not on Gamstop UK. Many of these sites offer a variety of markets, including qualification, handicap bets, and player propositions like top goalscorers. They also permit gamblers who have signed up for Gamstop to place bets.

The national team will be without the legendary Gareth Bale who was so instrumental in recent qualification campaigns. The 35-year-old retired in 2023 after scoring 41 goals in 111 appearances.

Aaron Ramsey was another key player, but the current Cardiff star would be 35 when the tournament comes around. Another reason that football has overtaken rugby as Wales' top sport is the performances of Cardiff and Swansea who currently play in the English Championship, but have both featured in the Premiership relatively recently.

While it has been knocked from its perch, Rugby Union is still massively popular in Wales and is ingrained in the country's culture.

The Welsh national side has won the Six Nations tournament an impressive 28 times, second only to England, and has also featured at every Rugby World Cup. Three World Cup semi-finals have helped the Welsh national team hit 8th position in the rankings.

The Millenium Stadium dates back to 1999 and has a capacity of 74,500. Located in Cardiff, it hosts home national games and is also known as the Principality Stadium.

As well as football and rugby, the country also has a proud athletic tradition with a host of gold medal Olympians including Lauren Price, Hannah Mills, Calum Jarvis, and Matt Richards who all competed at the 2020 Tokyo Games.

The country's most successful Olympian of all time is Paulo Radmilovic who won four gold medals across three Olympic Games including the 1908 London Olympics, 1912 Stockholm Olympics, and 1920 Antwerp Olympics, with 3 for Water Polo and 1 for swimming.

Golf is another popular sport in Wales with Ian Woosnam leading the way for Welsh golfers with 1 Major title and 52 tour wins.

When it comes to boxing, Wales has had some great fighters over the years including Percy Jones, Freddie Welsh, and Steve Robinson to name a few. However, it is Joe Calzaghe that most people think of when talking about boxing in Wales.

His incredible record of 46 wins and 0 losses saw his reign as the super middleweight champion become the longest in history at 11 years. His dominance helped the sport of boxing gain significant popularity.