Gloucester dealt a hammer blow as unfancied Wasps grab an away win

Gloucester were dealt a hammer blow in their quest to secure a Premiership play-off spot as unfancied Wasps came away with an unlikely 27-21 victory. Their forwards dominated the contest but Gloucester lacked flair and Wasps took advantage to take their limited chances to outscore their opponents by three tries to two.

Jacob Umaga, Gabriel Oghre and Charlie Atkinson scored their tries with Jimmy Gopperth converting all three and adding a penalty. Replacement Dan Robson also fired over a superb drop goal. Kyle Moyle scored a try for Gloucester and there was also a penalty try award with Adam Hastings kicking three penalties.

After a scrappy opening 14 minutes, Wasps conceded three penalties in quick succession and from the last, Hastings knocked over a simple kick to give his side the lead. Wasps suffered another setback when their flanker, Brad Shields, was forced to leave the field for an HIA having come off second best in a collision with Ruan Ackermann.

The game badly needed a spark of excitement and it looked to have got one when Wasps’ Alfie Barbeary burst away from a maul to run 45 metres before sending out a long pass to Paolo Odogwu, who forced way over. TMO replays were called for and they indicated that Barbeary had picked up the ball from an incorrect position so was deemed to be offside and the try ruled out.

The scrums became increasingly problematic as every engagement seemed to result in one front row or the other standing up and it came as no surprise when rival hookers, Jack Singleton and Oghre, were sin-binned for persistent infringement. At the next scrum, Wasps conceded a penalty, their tenth of the half, which Hastings kicked to leave Gloucester with a deserved 6-0 half-time lead.

Five minutes after the restart, the visitors scored the first try when Umaga charged down an attempted chip over from Santiago Carreras to run an unopposed 65 metres to score. Wasps stunned their opponents by soon scoring another when Oghre finished off a driving lineout but, straight from the kick-off, the hosts responded when Moyle collected his up and under to hold off the attentions of Umaga to score.

The conversion from Hastings rebounded back off a post but the outside half succeeded with a straightforward penalty to bring the scores level at the end of the third quarter. With 14 minutes remaining, Louis Rees-Zammit was sin-binned for a deliberate knock-on and Wasps immediately capitalised when Robson sent Atkinson over.

Gloucester need a response and it came in style when their pack provided an unstoppable line-out drive which earned a penalty try, with Wasps’ hooker Dan Frost yellow carded. The hosts looked favourites for the win but Robson fired over an excellent 45-metre drop goal before Gopperth added a penalty to secure victory.