The failure of Toulouse to claim a bonus point in a match they dominated offers Bath, who visit Glasgow today, a shaft of light. Although last season's beaten finalists lead the group by seven points, they visit the Recreation Ground next month and may come to curse a casualness that cost them at least three tries in the final quarter.

The Dragons will, as has become their custom, not make the quarter-finals. They went into the afternoon on the back of three successive home wins, although the last of them had been played two months before. Heavy overnight rain had given way to a dry, mild afternoon and, while parts of the playing surface were waterlogged, Toulouse felt emboldened enough to take the game to their hosts from the start.

They eased into a 16-point lead after 30 minutes without getting out of third gear. The Dragons had energy, but not the pace, strong in the set-pieces they had to fight for every millimetre with the ball in hand. It was endeavour against invention and so simple was Toulouse's opening score on four minutes that a sustained hush gripped the crowd. The Dragons had stolen Toulouse's first two line-outs, but they were undone by a fluent passing move along the entire backline that provided Maxime Medard with space along the right wing. He chipped ahead and easily won the race to the line with the centre Rory Sidey for David Skrela to convert.

It was Skrela's last contribution. The outside-half had been drafted in for Frédéric Michalak to provide goal-kicking security, but he made the mistake of trying to tackle the No 8 Joe Bearman head on and was left in a heap on the ground. He limped on for a few minutes before giving way to Michalak, who was to provide his usual mix of devil and despair.

Michalak kicked his side's next nine points, two penalties and a drop goal, but it should have been more. Byron Kelleher chipped to the line, but with enough of an angle on the kick to allow James Tovey to gather and clear in a hurry before Medard's grubber was just about dealt with by Gareth Wyatt.

The Dragons finally asserted themselves through a trusty set-piece to close the gap. Medard conceded a penalty at a breakdown near his own line, the ­Dragons kicked to touch and Bearman palmed the throw to the prop Rhys Thomas who encountered little resistance from Michalak. Thomas was fortunate not to be in the sin-bin when he was penalised for kicking the ball out of a ruck after Toulouse had worked an overlap; he should have had a second try after another Bearman line-out take, but lost control of the ball after being pushed over the line.

An Arlidge penalty brought the Dragons to within six points, but Toulouse emerged from the break hardened by words of rebuke in the dressing room. They started playing with pace again and, after Cedric Heymans was worked clear, Medard claimed his second try with another kick and chase as soon as the Dragons had replaced his opposite number with a ­centre. Toulouse chased the extra point, making line breaks at will, but they went for the difficult rather than the obvious and the Dragons came close to stealing a bonus point at the end, defiant to the last.