Newport Gwent Dragons Head Coach Paul Turner announces his team to face the Saracens tomorrow (Friday 22 August) at Rodney Parade, kick-off 7.30pm.

Paul is looking for a huge performance in front of their home crowd to emulate the success of the Dragons’ last game at Rodney Parade against Magners League Champions Leinster.

Paul said: "It will be good to be back at Rodney Parade. The fans always demand for us to win our matches at home. It's not always possible but the final whistle against Leinster proved to me again that if you can win games the fans will adore you."

He added: “We need to gel together quickly as a team. The match against Bedford looked like our first match of the season and we got caught cold. We need a better performance against Saracens tomorrow for ourselves and our fans.”

New Dragons hooker Tom Willis will captain the squad for the first time on the Men of Gwent’s home turf. The team is as follows:

15 Ashley Smith
14 Gareth Maule
13 Rory Sidey
12 Marc Stcherbina
11 Richard Fussell
10 James Arlidge
9 Wayne Evans
1 Adam Black
2 Tom Willis (c)
3 Rhys Thomas
4 Adam Jones
5 Luke Charteris
6 Joe Bearman
7 James Harris
8 Lewis Evans
16 Lloyd Burns
17 Lee Harrison/ Hugh Gustafson
18 Adam Brown
19 Jamie Ringer/ Richard Parks/ Grant Webb
20 Phil Dollman
21 Jason Tovey
22 Rob Lewis

Kevin Morgan and Duane Goodfield will not be available due to long-term injury to Achilles and knee (respectively).
The following players are expected to return for the new season: Martyn Thomas (shoulder), Rhodri Gomer Davies (knee), Gareth Wyatt (ankle), Andrew Williams (back), Tal Selley (neck), Shaun Connor (hamstring), Steve Jones (hip) and Andy Hall (back).

---