For Bristolian rugby fans weekends cannot come much better than this. First Bath, the old enemy from down the Avon, get a drubbing at Gloucester, announced before kick-off here to loud applause. Then the league champions turn up with what amounts to a second team, who make mistake after mistake and hand over 27 points in the first 35 minutes.

This was Leicester's second successive defeat here and, if their reverse in September 2000, could be explained by a stomach bug, guts in the metaphorical sense were the problem yesterday.

The champions looked to have little stomach for the fight, apart from when it came to off-the-ball fisticuffs. In first-half injury-time the Tigers' Adam Balding and Bristol's Julian White were sent off after a lengthy and ugly exchange of punches - and any sanction on Balding could have a bearing on Leicester's Heineken Cup final against Munster - but, oddly, Garath Archer and Peter Short avoided punishment for a similarly mindless descent into the red mist with 10 minutes remaining.

This was the only area in which Leicester achieved parity against a Bristol team who drove hard at them from the start, held the ball up well in the tackle and competed with far more urgency at the breakdown. Their forwards created enough quick ball for the mercurial Agustin Pichot and the captain Jason Little to inspire a youthful back line, who fired the ball wide time and again to stretchthe champions.

If Leicester looked a different team from the side who snatched victory against Llanelli the previous weekend, that was because they really were a different team, with only Ollie Smith and Geordan Murphy starting both matches. "We gave a lot of boys the chance to show what they could do," said Dean Richards, Leicester's director of rugby. "Some performed, some didn't." For "some" read "most", though Josh Kronfeld was an exception.

Bristol were behind their line within five minutes, with the England Under-21 centre Andrew Higgins diving between Will Johnson and Smith to put the home side ahead. The Bristol fly-half Felipe Contepomi, on his way to 23 points that enabled him to beat Mark Tainton's record for league points in a single season, then slotted two penalties as Leicester infringed repeatedly, spilled ball in the line-out and went every which way in the scrum.

Six minutes around the half-hour settled the match, with Little diving through a massive gap in the Leicester cover and Contepomi latching on to Glenn Gelderbloom's pass for a 40-metre interception try. Leicester responded immediately with a try and two penalties from Andy Goode but, once Goode was sent to the sin-bin for killing the ball early in the second half, they never looked like regaining the lost ground.

Bristol's five points were not enough to lift them over Newcastle into seventh in the table and they face the prospect of a return trip to Welford Road in three weeks in the Zurich Championship play-offs, when first will meet eighth. "It's a nice reward," said Dean Ryan, Bristol's director of rugby, "and I'm sure it will be in Leicester's minds." Indeed, there was much for the champions to contemplate as they headed back up the M5 yesterday.

Bristol: Best; Rees, Higgins (Daniel, 62min), Little (capt), Christophers; Contepomi, Pichot; Crompton, McCarthy (Nelson, 64), White, Archer, Brown, Short (Payne 44), Lipman, Sturnham (Brownrigg, 67).

Tries: Higgins, Little, Contepomi, Christophers. Cons: Contepomi 3. Pens: Contepomi 4.

Sent off: White, 40min.

Leicester: Murphy (Stimpson, 58); Smith, Lloyd, Gelderbloom, Booth (Healey, 78); Goode, Grindal (Ellis, 60); Freshwater (Jelley, 76), Cockerill (capt; Chuter, 67), Nebbett, Deacon, Short, W Johnson (Moody 42), Kronfeld, Balding.

Tries: Murphy, Kronfeld, Gelderbloom. Pens: Goode 2.

Sent off: Balding, 40min. Sin-bin: Goode 47min.

Referee: S Lander (Liverpool). Attendance: 6,566.

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