All polite guests bring a housewarming present when invited to a new home and Wasps were duly handed a timely gift by the Kent referee Roy Maybank in High Wycombe yesterday. A penalty try in the fifth minute of injury-time certainly ensured a dramatic finale at the Premiership's latest rugby venue but Wasps cannot rely on such generosity every week.
Even Warren Gatland, their director of rugby, felt his side had "got out of jail big time" after Maybank, the official at the centre of last week's controversial last-gasp Bath win over London Irish, ruled Bristol's Argentinian fly-half Felipe Contepomi had crept illegally around the side of a ruck one metre from the visitors' try-line, handing victory and a bonus point to a team that had been staring at a second self-inflicted defeat in eight days.
On this occasion Bristol's head coach Peter Thorburn did not dispute Maybank's timekeeping but was adamant the ball was safely out when Contepomi made his fateful lunge. "There's no God, is there," signed Thorburn. "The ball was out but it's the referee's decision and he decided Felipe came around the side. There were other things happening at that pile-up and Matt Salter received six or seven punches in his face. But you've got to hand it to Wasps. They kept their cool and won the game."
Maybank, who managed to award 35 full penalties, 17 of them against Wasps, during a game in which the lead changed hands nine times, was sticking to his guns after the game, however. "The penalty try was for Contepomi coming around from the wrong side of the ruck," he said, stressing he had already warned Bristol twice for pulling down mauls and told them the next offence would yield a penalty try.
Either way, it was a rough end to Contepomi's afternoon. The Pumas stand-off had kept Bristol in touch with a haul of 30 points, including an intercept try and seven penalties, and another hairline Maybank offside decision allowed him to put his side 35-31 ahead in the 78th minute. In the end, though, the game concluded with Contepomi and Lawrence Dallaglio exchanging blows and harsh words before the pair belatedly made up with a bear-hug in the tunnel.
Dallaglio brushed it off later as "harmless banter" but had the result gone the other way, Gatland's response would have been volcanic given his team conceded 26 penalties at Newcastle last Sunday and were kicked to death by Jonny Wilkinson. "I thought they were pretty unlucky at the end and they probably deserved to win," he growled. "If that had been our player penalised I'd have been disappointed."
For neutral supporters, at least, there was more than enough incident to persuade them to become a regular member of Buckinghamshire's Adams family. Quite apart from six tries and a frighteningly big hit on Ross Beattie by Trevor Leota which knocked the Bristol captain out cold, the basking crowd of 7,171 clearly relished the fresher air and more convivial atmosphere than was mostly the case in Shepherd's Bush.
The move from Loftus Road is theoretically a two-year deal but such is the feelgood factor one senses the club will be loath to return to the smoke. The well-known rugby nursery of RGS High Wycombe, alma mater of recent England internationals such as Matt Dawson, Nick Beal and Nick Duncombe, provides a handy conveyor belt of players and the improved odds on returning to a car with all four hubcaps makes the tree-edged stadium equally attractive.
All that remains is to make the place a fortress to compare to the provincial strongholds of Leicester, Gloucester and Northampton, a target which will require big improvements in Wasps' restarts and discipline. If Alex King and Rob Howley were once again exempt from any criticism, King supplying 15 points and Howley providing the fine angled run which prefaced Dallaglio's pivotal 56th minute try, Gatland was less impressed with some of his younger forwards such as Paul Volley and Richard Birkett after both wasted good positions with needless ruck offences.
Bristol, for their part, responded brightly after Leota had scored Wasps' first Premiership try at the stadium.
Wasps: Lewsey; Roiser, Abbott (Wigram, 73), Denney, Logan; King, Howley; Molloy (Dowd, 59), Leota (Greening, 58), Green, Shaw, Birkett, Worsley, Volley, Dallaglio (capt).
Tries: Leota, Abbott, Dallaglio, penalty try. Cons: King 3. Pens: King 4.
Yellow card: Denney 22.
Bristol: Best; Daniel, Rees, Shaw, Christophers; Contepomi, Pichot; Crompton (Johnstone, 64), Nelson, White (Bergamaschi, 64), Archer, Brown (Sheridan, 72), Sturnham, Lipman, Beattie (capt; Salter, 42).
Tries: Best, Contepomi. Cons: Contepomi 2. Pens: Contepomi 7.
Yellow card: Best 42.
Referee: R Maybank (London).
