EBBW Vale flanker Ronny Kynes has won the penultimate Principality Premiership Player of the Month award of the season.

The 29-year-old openside, a cult hero at Eugene Cross park for his energy, work-rate all around the park and 'Catch 'n' Kynes' driving lineout tries, has been turning heads all season and earlier in the week was voted as the Welsh Rugby Writers’ Association’s Premiership player of the year.

The back row forward from New Tredegar has been to the fore in the Steelmen's charge up the table since November and will be the fore in Sunday's play-off semi-final at Llandovery.

In March the bricklayer helped Ebbw clinch three out of three league wins and with two more wins in April they grabbed third place.

They travel to Church Bank on Sunday (kick-off 2.30pm, live on S4C) looking to earn a second successive grand final at Pontypridd.

Kynes puts the Steelmen's consistency down to the togetherness in the squad built up when they rallied from Premiership relegation in "There's a brilliant environment at Ebbw Vale. I've been here five years and we have a consistent squad in training week in, week out," said the flanker.

"Jason (Strange) did a lot of good work and Nigel (Davies) has done a great job since coming in last year too.

"We never doubted we could do well in the Premiership. Last year was a fantastic achievement to reach the final and we wanted to go one better this year and win.

"We left it late but luckily we found some consistency in the last couple of months and made the play-offs.

"Sunday will be tough at Llandovery, especially after they've won the Swalec Cup last week but we're looking forward to it all the same."