Dame Tanni is the leader of Oz pack (From Penarth Times)

Dame Tanni is the leader of Oz pack

FORMER St Cyres pupil Dame Tanni Grey Thompson will lead team Wales to Oz for next year's Commonwealth Games.

Dame Tanni has been invited to captain Team Wales again at the games to be held in Melbourne.

The Melbourne Cricket Ground will host the opening ceremony of the XVIII Commonwealth Games (15-26 March).

And Tanni, aged 36, experienced her first dress rehearsal for the Australian showdown when she took centre stage against the backdrop of The Wizard of Oz production at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff.

First Minister, the Rt Hon Rhodri Morgan AM, was on hand to make the captaincy presentation.

Tanni has won 16 Paralympic medals - 11 of which are gold - six London Marathon titles, third place in the BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2000, and BBC Wales Sports Personality of the Year three times.

She took to the track at the Manchester Games in 2002 - only five months after giving birth to her daughter Carys - and secured a personal best time in the 800m, to finish just outside the medals in fourth place.

Tanni said: "I can honestly say that competing at the Manchester Games and being selected to carry the flag was one of the most emotional experiences in my life as a senior athlete.

"When we got the call to walk into the stadium, I remember looking behind me and seeing 250 athletes in their Welsh kits and you could hear a pin drop.

"Suddenly, somebody among the team started singing Calon Lan and that was it - I was off.

"One of the biggest moments of my life and I was crying like a baby with mascara streaming down my face - and all on national television."