Brive give championship display

Brive displayed an imaginative repertoire worthy of European champions with a brilliantly crafted three try victory over battling Wasps at Loftus Road yesterday. Six penalty goals by Gareth Rees, the Wasps' marksman, never looked like being sufficient to overcome French opponents who booked their semi-final place with grace, style and power. The main side effect of Wasps's defeat - incidentally their fourth in a row - was to hand Bath, the only surviving English club, a home draw for their semi-final against Pau on December 20th. Toulouse, the 1996 champions, will be involved in an all French semi-final at home to Brive. The final will be staged at a French venue on January 31st.

Brive were applauded off the field by a spirited Wasps side that would probably admit in private that they were out-classed in vital decision making areas. Each time Wasps edged in front the holders demonstrated a rare ability to raise their game and score further tries by Loic van der Linden and Jerome Carrat after a stunning early touch down by Sebastian Carrat.

"We showed passion and commitment but ultimately we were not able to finish off our attacking movies," said Lawrence Dallaglio, the Wasps' captain. "When we were leading 15-10 we attacked their 22 but we gave away a soft try of a type you should never concede at this level. Brive took their chances and defended extremely well."

Wasps were far from dead and buried in the closing stages as they showed with several swashbuckling sorties by their loose forwards, yet Brive always seemed able to dip into their box of surprises and pull out another inventive ploy with a telling back row move or a shrewd change of direction in the midfield.

At one stage the London side had to defend desperately to prevent the holders finishing with another imperious score. Brive could not have shown a more lethal sense of timing, putting Wasps under pressure with converted tries at the start and finish of the first half.

Dallaglio was left for dead when the Brive full-back Sebastian Viars made a blind side break down the left touchline before offloading to Sebastian Carrat who had time to cruise towards the posts and make a simple conversion kick for Lamaison.

On the stroke of half-time an error by the Wasps' scrum-half, Martyn Wood, who lost the ball in midfield allowed Olivier Magne and Philippe Carbonneau to set up an old fashioned foot rush down the left flank.

Shane Roiser failed to hack the ball away from the edge of his 22 and in a twinkling the rangy flanker, van der Linden had crashed over for a merited try. Between times Brive ran through the full gamut of infringement, forced and unforced, which gave the Wasps' goal kicker Rees the opportunity to slot home five first half penalties.

It was the French side's habit of standing off side that gifted Rees most of his points-after half an hour Wasps led 15-7-yet Brive, a penalty goal by Lamaison for off side, still showed sufficient fire power to turn round two points in front.

From the re-start Wasps applied sustained pressure to the French line, with Nick Greenstock

getting within a whisker of the score, but all the hosts had to show for their efforts was another penalty goal by Rees after the Brive pack dropped a scrum. Soon afterwards Simon Mitchell, the Wasps' hooker was spotted by the referee raising a knee in a scrum and Lamaison hammered over a superb 45 metre penalty goal from near the right touchline.

Brive appeared to draw fresh inspiration from that score, bringing extra pace and vigour to their driving and transferring the ball rapidly through successive phases. It came as no surprise to see Brive plunder a third try in the 56th minute through their right wing Jerome Carrat who picked up a low trundling pass from Carbonneau before crashing over at the flag. That was by no means the last hurrah but it did prove to be the final score.

Scorers: Wasps: Penalties Rees (6). Brive Tries: S. Carrat, van der Linden, J. Carrat. Conversions Lamaison (2) Penalties Lamaison (2).

Wasps: Rees; Roiser, Greenstock, Henderson, Logan; King, Wood; Molloy, Mitchell, Green, Cronin, Reed, Dallaglio (capt), Volley, Sheasby.

Brive: Viars; J Carrat, Lamaison, Venditti, S Carrat; Carbonneau (capt), Bonnet, Casadei, Travers, Crespy, Allegret, Manhes, van den Linden, Magne, Duboisset.

Referee: C Muir (Scotland).

European Conference: semi-final draw - Colomiers v Stade Francais; Agen v Newcastle. Matches to be played on the weekend of December 20th/21st.

European Cup: semi-final draw - Toulouse v Brive; Bath v Pau. Matches to be played on the weekend of December 20th-21st.