It's like one of those juggernauts you see rolling down the motorways, the monsters with a forklift truck attached to the back. Gloucester have this beast of a team and then they have this extra little machine on the end: Marcel Garvey, aged all of 19 and a right gem.
The wing is built like a forklift, but he has a turbo engine of his own and a built-in disco. The boy can make James Simpson-Daniel, who made a cameo appearance lasting three minutes at the end, look like a 20st plod. Garvey ripped in for three tries - well, two scorchers and a run-in middle one whose touchdown looked a bit suspect - and is the latest red-hot property in a Zurich Premiership that is churning out individual talent by the pallet, as they say in the forklift truck trade.
The funny thing was that although Gloucester's win was comprehensive enough in the end and they duly remain unbeaten, and although Bristol remain without a single victory in four outings and at times showed exactly why - what with their propensity to lose the ball all too readily in the meaty contact area - there was always a raw derby edge to the game, a neat complement to the Marcel cabaret.
In general, however, Bristol were plodding through treacle. Out of which they sometimes sprang with enough zest to pose a problem. In short, they took a 10-point lead which gave Gloucester the boot to rear they required. Not that the lead was accumulated with any elegance at first. Take their first try, for example.
Ross Beattie, not long for this field even though this was only the fifth minute, was held by Andy Gomersall at the back of a scrum. The ball went loose. It was side-footed by Agustin Pichot in the vague direction of his three-quarters. The ball went looser. It was picked up by newcomer from New Zealand Daryl Gibson, also destined to depart injured not long thereafter, and the centre's pass returned the ball to its bouncing passage across the field. It was finally picked up by wing Brendon Daniel, who proceeded to beat just about everyone on the Gloucester team for a solo try.
Felipe Contepomi added a penalty and Gloucester were forced to show something more positive than Ludovic Mercier's punting and Robert Todd's cut-back charges. The positive was Garvey. He picked up a nondescript ball near halfway and twitched his way through the first set of tackles and then purred to the line.
His second - the dodgy one - came after good build-up work by Henry Paul, now reinvented as a second-favourite before the Shed, and Todd and Junior Paramore. The try put Gloucester into the lead for the first time, a lead they never looked like surrendering, although there were still turning points to come.
In the second half, Jake Boer - and what a good game the flanker had - finished off a line-out-catch-and-drive, a trademark Gloucester try that should have knocked Bristol clean out. But back they came, with a try by Garath Archer, following a steal on the Gloucester throw.
And how much closer might they have come to a shock had Michael Lipman held on to an interception and had David Rees made more of another breakdown in the Gloucester midfield.
As it was, they finally cracked when their very best passage of play, a long, patient set of phases involving a lot of the charging Andrew Sheridan, led only to James Forrester launching a counter from his own 22. Paul, Terry Fanolua and Thinus Delport continued the move and Paramore, not known for his long-striding, galloped up to finish it all off.
That should have been that but Garvey had one last dance left. Sensational. He took a ball tight to the touch-line, flat-footed two defenders, chipped over Shane Drahm and won the race to the touchdown. Clive Woodward may have come to watch the grown-ups, but Garvey must have been inked down for future reference in the England set-up.
Mercier added a try of his own, plus a conversion, a French driver to this beast of a machine, plus its accessory, that is breaking the speed-limit of the English premiership.
Gloucester: Paul; Garvey, Fanolua (Beim 79), Todd, Delport (Simpson-Daniel 77); Mercier, Gomersall; Woodman, Fortey (Azam 56), Vickery (capt), Fidler (Pearce 67), Cornwell, Boer, Forrester, Paramore (Buxton 77).
Tries: Garvey (3), Boer, Paramore, Mercier. Cons: Mercier (3). Pens: Mercier (3).
Bristol: Williams (Drahm 68); Daniel, Rees, Gibson (Shaw 18), Christophers; Contepomi, Pichot; Crompton (Bergamasci 55), McCarthy (Nelson 78), White, Archer, Brown (Sheridan 55), Sturnham, Lipma, Beattie (capt; Salter 7)
Tries: Daniel, Archer. Con: Contepomi. Pens: Contepomi (2)
Referee: T Spreadbury (Somerset).
att: 10,117
