A five-metre scrum kept the pressure on the visitors and a penalty for Quins at the scrum was run rather than kicked but the attack foundered when Quins were penalised for an offence at the breakdown.  

Wasps’ response was to mount a strong counter-attack and they were soon camped on the Harlequins try-line until a knock-on gave a scrum to relieve the home team and a penalty against the visitors allowed Quins to clear.  The relief was short-lived as a good break by the Wasps fullback, Lawler, penetrated the Quins defence and quick ball to the right wing produced a try for Bishay, converted by Walder to give the visitors a 0 - 7 lead after seventeen minutes.

Both sides were guilty of too many unforced errors and aided by some idiosyncratic refereeing, stoppages were frequent.  Then an attack started by Gomarsall and continued by Luveniyali and Stegmann took play almost to the Wasps’ line where a penalty allowed Seb Jewell to kick Quins’ first points of the match.

A yellow card for Robson reduced Quins to fourteen men for the rest of the half and Wasps took the three points from the simple penalty kick that followed.  Quins responded by a hard chase for a fine box kick from Gomarsall and a turn over in the ruck increased the pressure on the visitors.  A charge down produced an attacking scrum on the Wasps’ five-metre line and they conceded a penalty at the set piece.  Jewell’s kick took the score to 6 – 10 at half time.

A penalty for each team in the opening six minutes of the second half moved the score on to 9 – 13.  But now Harlequins were dominating the set piece.  The Wasps’ scrum was being disrupted and they rarely had clean ball from the lineout.  Quins continued to press and found themselves camped on the Wasps’ try line for long minutes.  Their first surge over the line was held up, but continued pressure from the ensuing scrum saw Alex Rogers driven over for the try.  Jewell converted and Quins took the lead at 16 – 13.

The Harlequins forwards were now ever more dominant and a further offence at the breakdown allowed Jewell to kick a further three points and extend the lead to 19 – 13.  Almost inevitably, having been warned a couple of times by the referee about offences at the breakdown, a yellow card for the Wasps’ openside flanker put Harlequins more firmly in control although the visitors were defending strongly.

Time was running out and the visitors tried vainly to mount an attack that might bring them a win. Another penalty attempt by Jewell from 40 metres curled wide and another, almost as long, also went wide. 

Then from a kick through into the in-goal area Wasps’ full back caught the ball and having first tried to run the ball in a last desperate attempt at achieving a win tried to kick clear.  Unfortunately for the visitors the ball hit the cross bar and rebounded down into the hands of Micky Pointing who had merely to touch down for the try that deprived Wasps of a losing bonus point.  Jewell added the points for the conversion and the final whistle went.

The win takes Quins to the top of the group table on the basis of a superior points difference of  +7.  Both Wasps and Quins have still to play Worcester A again and the results of those matches will determine whether Quins reach the semi final or have to play off to do so.

TEAM
15. Waisea Luveniyali, 14. Seb Stegmann, 13. George Lowe, 12. Tosh Masson, 11. Sam Smith, 10. Seb Jewell, 9. Andy Gomarsall (Capt), 8. Phil Davies, 7. Neil McMillan, 6. Tom Sargeant, 5. George Robson, 4. James Percival, 3. Mark Lambert, 2. Tani Fuga, 1. Aston Croall.
Replacements: Alex Rogers; Micky Pointing; Ignacia Elosu; James Inglis; Joe Trayfoot; Gareth Williams; Ross Chisholm.

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