Wasps soar to Heineken Cup semi-finals spot

Apr 2 2007 Jonathan Roberts, Western Mail

Wasps 35-13 Leinster

WASPS outplayed Leinster in the second half to power their way into the Heineken Cup semi-finals.

Alex King kicked the hosts into a 6-0 lead before Leinster's Chris Whitaker burst over but Eoin Reddan's long-range try put Wasps 13-10 ahead at the break.

Lawrence Dallaglio's sin-binning looked to have turned things Leinster's way, but Wasps scored twice in his absence and went from strength to strength.

James Haskell, Danny Cipriani and Reddan all crossed to seal the victory.

It is the first time Wasps have reached the knock-stages since they won the tournament in 2004, and they now face an away semi-final against Northampton at Coventry's Ricoh Arena.

The match was billed as the hosts' forwards against Leinster's backs, and there was no doubt about which unit came off best at Adams Park.

With Brian O'Driscoll out injured, much rested on Leinster's Felipe Contepomi and the Argentine got off to an inauspicious start as his kick-off failed to travel the required 10m.

In contrast, Wasps number 10 Alex King began with a well-struck penalty in the second minute to settle his side, and a second kick 10 minutes later confirmed Wasps' dominance.

Shortly afterwards a fluid handling move from Leinster and a drive from the hard-working Stephen Keogh set up the position, and Whitaker burst into a gap created by a slight misjudgement by Joe Worsley to cross unopposed.

Wasps were lacking fluency, with Cipriani guilty of stopping two promising moves in their tracks. The 19-year-old was playing in the biggest match of his fledgling career, and Leinster were not slow to target him.

It was Leinster who enjoyed the best of the first half's remaining minutes and with the pressure on, Dallaglio felt he had no choice but to kill the ball under the posts - and the referee felt he had no choice but to send the former England captain to the sin-bin.

Contepomi kicked the resulting penalty to send his side into the break three points adrift.

But if Leinster had planned to take advantage of their numerical advantage with an assault at the start of the second half, they were severely disappointed.

Wasps replacement Haskell - on for Worsley - burst over two minutes after the break following a subtle pass out of contact from Tom Palmer.

Two further tries followed and, although

Leinster never gave up, their ideas dried up rapidly as Wasps held on for a comfortable 35-13 victory.