Welsh rugby is still reeling from arguably its darkest day yet, with this year's winless Six Nations campaign ending with a humiliating 68-14 at the hands of England. It is a result that has caused embarrassment, anger and apathy amongst Wales fans, who have watched their team fall to 17 successive Test match defeats with the national game facing major challenges amid calls for widespread reform. But 20 years ago today, the feeling couldn't have been more different, with Wales on top of the world as they ended their 27-year wait for a Grand Slam win. Back in 2005, Mike Ruddock's side took the championship by storm and blew their rivals away, with hundreds of thousands of fans descending on Cardiff to be part of a momentous day that saw them defeat Ireland on the final weekend. It all feels worlds away now, but here's where the heroic members of the side that started that match two decades ago are today. 15. Kevin Morgan It was Morgan's now-famous try that sealed the Grand Slam that day but the man himself admits he can't remember the actual moment, previously telling WalesOnline: "Maybe I destroyed a few brain cells with the beer I drank that night and the next day!". Then of the Dragons, the 48-cap international full-back left Rodney Parade in 2009 before joining Neath as a player/fitness coach. After hanging up his boots at the club the following year, Morgan completed a Masters degree in Physiology and took up a role at the Ospreys, where he stayed for eight years. He left the region in 2018 and spent a year as head of physical performance with the Georgian Rugby Union, before taking up a new post as first-team athletic performance coach at Bristol Bears. 14. Mark Taylor Taylor was a surprise inclusion against Ireland, with the then-32-year-old receiving a last-minute summons to replace the injured Rhys Williams on the wing, having not played there for over six years. “Mike Ruddock asked if I could play out on the wing because we were short. I told him I’d play tight-head prop if it meant I’d be involved,” he later recalled. The first man to score a try at the Millennium Stadium, Taylor had already made his mark on Welsh rugby long before the heroics of 2005. After starring for Pontypool, Swansea and the Scarlets, he left Wales that summer for Sale - where he won a Premiership title - before moving back over the bridge and joining Ospreys, where he hung up his boots in 2008. Now 52, Taylor spent time as team manager for Wales U20s and the Scarlets, but he now works as an accountant for his family's car dealership in Llanelli. 13. Tom Shanklin The centre arguably deserved to be named player of the match on that famous day in Cardiff, with a superb performance seeing hhim cut the Irish defence to shreds and set up Morgan's winning try. Shanklin retired from rugby in 2011 following a fourth knee operation, having won 70 Wales caps and scored 20 tries, while also representing London Welsh, Saracens and Cardiff at club level. He was also called up for the 2005 British & Irish Lions tour. These days, the 45-year-old is a popular TV pundit and podcast, regularly contributing to the BBC's rugby coverage and working as a co-host on the Flats and Shanks podcast with David Flatman, as well as the Stick to Rugby podcast He is also a commercial director of Genero Experiences, a leading corporate hospitality company. 12. Gavin Henson Welsh rugby's new superstar at the time, Henson took that championship by storm, with his famous kick against England and relationship with singer Charlotte Church helping to propel him to stardom. He would go on to win 33 caps for Wales, scoring 130 points, while he toured with the British & Irish Lions that summer. Then of the Ospreys, the centre's club career saw him also represent Cardiff and the Dragons, as well as Premiership sides London Welsh, Bath and Bristol and Toulon out in France. Henson has also ventured into reality TV, taking part in shows including 71 Degrees North, The Bachelor and Strictly Come Dancing, but these days runs his own pub - The Fox - in his home village of St Brides Major. Last summer, he also returned to rugby as he turned out for his boyhood club Pencoed RFC. 11. Shane Williams While he had already been a Welsh international for five years by this point, the best was yet to come from the legendary wing. Williams would win a second Grand Slam in 2008, breaking Wales' all-time try scoring record in the final match of the tournament and going on to be named World Player of the Year. By the time he retired in 2011, he had 87 international caps and a record 58 tries to his name, having also scored 935 points in 280 appearances for clubs Neath, the Ospreys and Mitsubishi Sagamihara DynaBoars. Since retiring, the former flyer has worked as a pundit and presenter for the BBC and S4C and is the director of a fuel firm in West Wales. He is also a frequent entrant in Ironman events, completing last year's gruelling event in Tenby in an impressive 11 hours and 31 minutes at the age of 47. 10. Stephen Jones Wales’ on-pitch general, Jones would go on to win 104 caps for his country and become one of Test rugby's greatest-ever points scorers, with his tally of 970 still putting him ninth in the all-time list, 14 years after his last international match. The fly-half, who was chosen for two Lions tours, retired from rugby in 2013, having spent the bulk of his career with Llanelli and the Scarlets as well as spells with Clermont and Wasps. He began his coaching career with Wasps and worked under Wayne Pivac as the Scarlets' backs coach before receiving a last-minute call-up to replace Rob Howley in Warren Gatland's coaching team at the 2019 World Cup. Jones stayed with Wales for three years but after Gatland decided to shake up his backroom team again, the fly-half now coaches in Super Rugby with Moana Pasifika. 9. Dwayne Peel Awarded the man-of-the-match award against Ireland, it was the second such accolade for Peel during that campaign. Later that year, he was the youngest player selected for the Lions tour to New Zealand while, in 2007, he also became the youngest player to win 50 caps for Wales. He would go on to win 26 more, the last of which came in 2011, while he retired from rugby for good in 2016 having represented Llanelli, the Scarlets, Sale and Bristol. After starting his coaching career with Bristol, he became assistant coach at Ulster in 2017 before leaving four years later to take up the head coach job at the Scarlets. 1. Gethin Jenkins The legendary prop scored four tries in his 14 years at international level - but none so memorable as his charge-down score against Ireland to help seal the Grand Slam. One of a small group of Welsh players to have won three Grand Slam titles, Jenkins - known as 'Melon' - retired from the game in 2018 having won a then-record of 129 Wales caps and featured in five Lions Tests. At club level, he represented Pontypridd and Celtic Warriors and had two stints with Cardiff either side of a spell with Toulon. After hanging up his boots, he began his coaching career at Arms Park before becoming Wales' defence coach under Wayne Pivac. However, he returned to Cardiff in 2023 as the club's new defence coach on a consultancy basis, before taking on a full-time role the following summer. 2. Mefin Davies The popular hooker featured in Wales' Grand Slam triumph just a year after being left without a club, following the winding up of Celtic Warriors in 2004. During that time, he turned down a lucrative offer from Stade Francais in order to focus on playing for his country and, after joining Gloucester, saw that move pay off as he tasted Six Nations glory months later. Davies would retire in 2012, having played 38 times for his country and also represented the likes of Neath, Pontypridd, Leicester Tigers and the Ospreys over the course of his career. In retirement, he moved into coaching with Worcester Warriors and, following their collapse, spent four seasons with the Dragons as a scrum coach. However, he left Rodney Parade last year and, now 52, works as an electrical engineer. 3. Adam Jones Another icon of Welsh rugby, Jones won 95 caps for Wales and five for the Lions over the course of his career, while the Six Nations title he won in 2005 would prove to be the first of four for the legendary prop. He retired from the game in 2018, having made nearly 300 career appearances at club level with Neath, the Ospreys, Cardiff and Harlequins. That same year, he would begin his coaching career at the Stoop, helping Quins to the Premiership title in 2021. Earlier this year, he was brought into the Wales national set-up on secondment to act as a scrum consultant for Warren Gatland and later Matt Sherratt. 4. Brent Cockbain While represented Australia at age-grade level, Cockbain qualified for Wales on residency grounds and went on to win 24 international caps in the red jersey. The lock played for Pontypridd, Celtic Warriors and the Ospreys, winning the Celtic League title with the latter the same year that he tasted Grand Slam glory. He would move across the border for a spell with Sale before retiring as a player and moving back to Australia in 2010, from which point few people from Wales were still in touch with him. However, WalesOnline caught up with him nearly a decade later, when he was working in an opencast coal mine in Queensland, having spent the years before that picking fruit on his friend's farm and sailing up and down the coast on his boat. 5. Robert Sidoli A mainstay in the Welsh second row throughout the campaign, Sidoli would win 42 caps for Wales before his international career came to an end in 2007. His club career saw him play for Pontypridd, Celtic Warriors, Cardiff and Bristol, while he featured nearly 120 times for the Dragons before announcing his retirement in 2014. After hanging up his boots, he worked as forwards coach for Pontypridd before becoming a rugby manager at Newport High School Academy and helping to develop the stars of the future. 6. Ryan Jones Another triple Grand Slammer, Jones would go on to lead Wales to the same success as captain in 2008, as well as another championship title in 2013. He retired from rugby in 2015, having won 75 Wales caps and represented the Lions in three Tests, as well as playing for Newport, Bridgend, Celtic Warriors, the Ospreys and Bristol. The former flanker then took up roles with the WRU as head of participation and performance director, before stepping down in 2020. He is now a leadership and management consultant, while he revealed in 2022 that he had been diagnosed with early onset dementia, and probable chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). 7. Martyn Williams The player of the tournament in 2005, Williams was a world-class openside flanker and became just the third player to win a century of Wales caps, while he also featured at three World Cups and was selected for as many Lions tours. After retiring from rugby in 2012 having spent his career with Pontypridd and Cardiff, the man known as 'Nugget' initially moved into punditry and worked for Cardiff financial company Castle Court. However, he returned to the Wales set-up in 2020 when he was appointed team manager under Wayne Pivac, a role he still holds today. "My main job is to co-ordinate each group from the coaches, head of medical, strength & conditioning, analysts, media, and players," Williams told WalesOnline last year. "I will sit down regularly with the heads of department of each key strand of the national team. "I've got nothing to do with what happens on the field. I don't get involved with the rugby side of things in terms of coaching and selection. That's absolutely nothing to do with me. I'm in charge of everything off the field." 8. Michael Owen The on-pitch captain when Wales defeated Ireland on that famous day, Owen lifted the Six Nations trophy alongside Gareth Thomas, who had started the campaign as skipper before picking up an injury. He would go on to be picked for that summer's Lions tour, captaining them in the warm-up Test in Cardiff, but would be forced to retire just five years later at the age of 29 due to a knee injury. The No.8 hung up his boots having won 41 Wales caps and representing Pontypridd, the Dragons and Saracens at club level. After his early retirement, Owen retrained as a teacher and moved to Hertfordshire, where he is now director of rugby at Haileybury College.