Wasps chase home play-off despite long winter fright

Dallaglio will be appearing in his final league match
Chris Jones13 April 2012

London Wasps have their eyes on a top-two finish and a home Premiership play-off match and are confident they can obtain it with a bonus-point win at doomed Leeds tomorrow.

The midweek victory over Newcastle lifted Wasps up to third place, a marvellous achievement in itself given the club were bottom of the table for one week in October during the World Cup.

However, after getting all their internationals back following the Six Nations championship, Wasps put together eight successive wins until losing against Gloucester last weekend. The Newcastle victory was their fifth in a row on the road.

Those statistics highlight why the club have adopted the slogan: 'Wasps - dangerous at this time of the year!'

However, Danny Cipriani, their mercurial outside-half, is still troubled by the after-effects of a virus and Ian McGeechan, the club's director of rugby, accepts he will have to manage his players carefully to ensure they are ready for the play-offs.

Yet McGeechan still believes his men can produce another bonus-point win despite facing a third game in a week.

"We have done this before and know what's required," he said. "We have put ourselves in a position to have a big say in what happens on the last weekend of the regular season."

Wasps, who will recall captain Lawrence Dallaglio for his final regular-season match for the club, are three points behind Bath, who face leaders Gloucester at Kingsholm.

Saracens, meanwhile, will bid farewell to England flanker Richard Hill against Bristol at Milton Keynes (Watford are using Vicarage Road for their play-off semi-final) after 15 years of outstanding club service.

The 2003 World Cup winner deserves a more impressive stage but the MK Dons ground will have to suffice. At least it has given the man they call 'Victor Meldrew' something to moan about on his final day.

This will be Hill's 288th and final appearance for Sarries and he said: "It's a bit disappointing but Milton Keynes looks like a great venue and, hopefully, we'll have a lot of our fans at the ground.

"It's not the venue I would have expected to complete my playing days at and it will be my fourth 'home' ground as a Saracen."

>London Irish complete their season at Sale, who are fourth and desperate to remain in that play-off place. Irish know a win could see them claim a Heineken Cup place if Leicester lose. Irish could leapfrog Leicester into sixth place and then have to wait and see if Bath can beat Worcester in the European Challenge Cup Final.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in