Bonymaen

Boxing Day belongs to Neath. The fixture is played every year at The Gnoll, and it is the one date in Bonymaen's calendar that needs no explanation locally.

The village had rugby before the club did: Evan and Dai James were playing for Wales in the 1890s, two decades before Bonymaen itself took shape in 1914 under the name Bonymaen Wanderers. Parc Mawr, on Cefn Hengoed Road, has picked up the nickname "God's little garden" for its views over the valley, which is a generous way to describe a ground with no recorded capacity.

What the club is best known for now is the man it did not keep. Alun Wyn Jones started here before going on to win 158 caps for Wales and captain the Lions, and Bonymaen's honours board reads like the accompaniment to that fact rather than a rival to it — a Division One West title in 2006-07 that brought no promotion, because the ground did not meet the criteria; a league and cup double in 2014-15, Division One West Central and the West Wales Cup in the same season; a WRU Plate final lost to Brecon in 2018-19.

The women's side has since given the club its most recent silverware, beating Haverfordwest 32-16 at the Principality Stadium in 2024 to take the WRU National Women's Plate — the club's honour, not a footnote to the men's. The first team, for its part, is still working the WRU leagues out of Division One West Central, with Neath waiting again come December.