Thomas wants to shed 'nearly-men' tag

'The opposition think it is nice to play Wales'

Wales captain Gareth Thomas declared on Tuesday that the time has come for his side to shed their tag of 'nearly-men' and beat New Zealand in Saturday's hotly-anticipated clash at the Millennium Stadium.

The Welsh public have a growing expectation that Wales can secure their first victory over the All Blacks in 51 years and in doing so end a frustrating run of near misses against the major nations in the last year.

They were beaten by the All Blacks in a frenetic World Cup clash in Sydney and a week later gave England an almighty scare in the quarter-final.

They did it again to Sir Clive Woodward's men in the RBS Six Nations clash at Twickenham and then lost by one converted score to Grand Slam winners France.

Two weeks ago Wales lost to South Africa, the Tri-Nations champions, by two points at the Millennium Stadium and Thomas believes the time has now come for them to finally claim that big scalp.

"We have a tag as the nearly men," he said before training today.

"(The opposition think) 'it's nice to play Wales because it's always a good game, always a couple of tries but we'll always come out as winners'.

"I think it is time to end that. I thought the time had come against South Africa. I believed before the match against South Africa we could have beaten them. I believe going into the New Zealand game that we can beat them and so do the rest of the team.

"To shake that tag would be a hindrance off our shoulders. It is getting a a bit of a pain now. The boys do want to win and they do want to take one of the big teams out.

"I want to win every game, the players want to win every game and the public want us to win every game - the pressure is on but I do believe we have a team capable of winning."

Despite his rousing words, Thomas is anxious that the Wales supporters do not get ahead of themselves.

Understandably they are desperate to witness a famous victory over the All Blacks - the Millennium Stadium will be sold out for the first time this autumn - but Thomas has played down assertions that Wales might actually be favourites.

"I think it is good for us at the moment. It is probably the first time ever that this has happened," he said.

"It is good for the players that the nation believes you are in with a chance,"

"If people think we can pull off a shock victory it is credit for what the boys have done in the last couple of weeks. The boys have earned this tag and hopefully we can go out and pull off a shock win.

"When things like that are involved the hardest thing is to try and keep the boys' feet on the floor and stay realistic and not get carried away with the expectations of everyone else. Keep the expectations that you have got for yourself and take them into the game."

Although South Africa are champions of the southern hemisphere, Thomas views New Zealand as a more potent all-round threat.

While South Africa fed off Wales' mistakes for their points in Cardiff 10 days ago, Thomas is acutely aware that with the likes Daniel Carter, Joe Rokocoko and Doug Howlett, New Zealand are capable of creating chances from nothing.

"Realistically I don't think we are favourites," he said.

"The boys are upbeat but not over-confident. From one to 22 they are probably a lot more of a dangerous team. That is why we have got to work on our defence quite heavily this week.

"South Africa scored 28 points from our mistakes. New Zealand are a lot more capable of creating things with their own ball. They are capable of cutting teams to shreds.

"We have got Clive Griffiths in now working on defence. We are a lot more organised now in our defence we have a lot more structure."