Wasps win but Clermont have sting in the tail

LAWRENCE Dallaglio’s body, all 18 stone of it, was tense and coiled, like a baited bear on the brink of rebellion but, in the end, all he could do was thrust his head into his hands, with the frustration almost steaming from his ears.

When he finally looked up again from his seat at the post-match press conference, the tough questions still lingered over him and, in fairness to the big man, he met every one of them with the straightest of bats.

“I’m frustrated but you mustn’t forget that we won the game. Given the rugby we played in the first half, I’m disappointed we didn’t finish them off and put them out of the competition. We’ve given Clermont a lifeline and now three teams will be going for qualification, as opposed to two.

“We’ve got to do better against Llanelli. I guess the key game will come between Munster and Clermont (in France). We may need to go to Thomond Park and, not just win, but get a bonus point. All these things are hypothetical.”

His frustration wasn’t hard to empathise with. For just over 30 minutes, his side had played some of the most sublime rugby this competition has ever witnessed to open a 22-point lead. So how did they barely scrape home by one? Dallaglio’s summation was succinct and spot on.

“We played 40 minutes of absolutely outstanding Heineken Cup rugby — probably the best there has been for a long time — against a quality side, and then 40 minutes of the worst Heineken Cup rugby I’ve seen.

“The scoreboard reflects that. Not only did we blow four tries, we gifted them two while on the attack.”

Your take on the consequences of Saturday’s game in High Wycombe will depend on your angle of approach. For Wasps, it was four points on the one hand, a mini-disaster on the other. For Clermont — and Munster — it was an early Christmas bonus — quite literally in the former’s case.

The neutral was perhaps the biggest winner. Six tries, the manner of Clermont’s rebound from the ropes was astonishing and into the whole mix was thrown Alan ‘Blackey’ Black — home supporter who threw a punch at the visitor’s back row, Jamie Cudmore.

The score that swung the game had as its genesis the Wasps scrum-half Danny Cipriani, talked up as the next Jonny Wilkinson.

The kid’s skills in the first half were astounding — pace, power, passing — but when his speculative cross-field kick was intercepted by Aurelien Rougerie and delivered to the home try line five minutes after the break, the worm had turned.

Neither Dallaglio nor head coach Shaun Edwards could mask their annoyance with the 20-year old’s faults in that second half but they coated their displeasure with an acknowledgement that Cipriani’s troubles were symbolic of the entire team.

Munster folk will be delighted. After all, Wasps’ inability to gain a bonus point for a second week running could have serious consequences come late January but the DNA of this game may tell us more about the French side than it does the English.

Just a month ago, Vern Cotter’s team travelled to Limerick with damnation ringing in their ears after the former Bay of Plenty helmer took a scissors to his team selection and the resultant 23-point defeat seemed to confirm old criticisms about French teams’ schizophrenic attitude to Europe.

More of the same looked a possibility here although injuries rather than tinkering saw the Michelin-backed club post a team with nine changes from that which denied Wasps a losing bonus point a week earlier.

The devil is in the detail and it is worth pointing out Cotter went with a new full-back, two different centres, an out-half (Alex King) making his first start, an alternative hooker, a brand new second row and just one survivor in the back row.

You feared for Clermont after just 15 minutes and, even when King landed their first points from a penalty after 34 minutes, it was hard to view the second half as anything but a chore to be endured.

How then can Cotter explain the difference in attitude and application between his side’s European trips this month and last? He starts off by exhaling deeply before launching into a spiel obviously delivered before.

“I’ll try to explain it once and for all. When we played Munster it was only our third game of the season whereas the home union teams had been playing for much longer. We needed players to have a reference and that turned out to be the Munster match. It was important for them to have game time. They needed opportunities. Now we are a bit more oiled. Players know where they are going. Strategically the Munster game was important for the whole season.”

WASPS: J Lewsey; P Sackey, F Waters, R Flutey, T Voyce; D Cipriani, E Reddan; T Payne, R Ibanez, N Adams; S Shaw, G Skivington; J Haskell, T Rees, L Dallaglio.

Replacements: M van Gisbergen for Lewsey (30), T French for Adams (59), D Leo for Haskell (67).

CLERMONT: S Baikeinuku; A Rougerie, G Esterhuizen, PM Garcia, J Malzieu; A King, P Mignoni; L Emmanuelli, J Smit, M Scelzo; A Jacquet, C Samson; J Cudmore, F Alexandre, E Vermeulen.

Replacements: E Etien for Alexandre (46), M Ledesma for Scelzo (61), P Vigouroux for Samson (61), F Delasau for Rougerie (63), R Chanal for Garcia (67).

Referee: A Rolland (IRFU).