London Irish 20-24 Wasps

London Irish (10) 20
Tries: Hewat (2) Cons: Hewat, Lennard Pens: Hewat, Lennard

Wasps (18) 24
Tries: Lemi, van Gisbergen Cons: Walder Pens: Walder (3) Drop-goal: Lemi

The kicking of Dave Walder and the cutting edge of David Lemi saw Wasps open their LV= Cup campaign with a hard-fought victory at London Irish.

Lemi and Mark Van Gisbergen ran in tries for the visitors with Peter Hewat bagging two for Irish but Walder's more reliable boot gave Wasps the edge.

Lemi, whose first-half try was set up by Walder, then pushed Wasps out of reach with a second-half drop-goal.

Simon Shaw and Joe Simpson were yellow-carded late on but Wasps held on.

London Irish coach Toby Booth:
"I thought that was one of the most entertaining games of rugby I've seen for a while - irrespective of the result, which is obviously everything.

"I'm disappointed we lost but I was very encouraged by our ambition - and we played with the ball in hand.

"We made 13 changes; I wanted to answer a few questions on the depth of our squad, and we have shown we have good strength in depth.

"I think collectively it shows what a good place London Irish is at the moment."

Wasps director of rugby Tony Hanks:
"It's been a good week for us, coming off the disappointment of last week (a Premiership defeat to Leeds).

"We changed things around; the players did everything in terms of preparation.

"There were a lot of players out there looking to make an impression - and if I had come to watch, I would have gone him pretty happy. It was entertaining."

London Irish: Lennard, Hewat, Homer, Gower, Rudd, Malone, Richards, Murphy, Paice, Corbisiero, Perry, Johnson, Roche, Fisher, Thorpe.

Replacements: Catt for Gower (64), Watson for Rudd (69), Buckland for Paice (61), Lahiff for Corbisiero (75), Garvey for Johnson (61), S. Armitage for Fisher (75). Not Used: Lalanne, Coetzee.

Wasps: van Gisbergen, Varndell, Jacobs, Mitchell, Lemi, Walder, Fury, Beech, Ward, Baker, Shaw, Skivington, Hart, Worsley, Ellis.

Replacements: Simpson for Fury (59), Bocca for Beech (80), Whitehead for Ward (61), Broster for Baker (49). Not Used: Veale, Matthews, Hickey, Odejobi.

Sin Bin: Shaw (79), Simpson (80).

Att: 10,010

Ref: J Kaplan (South Africa)

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