Wednesday night sees an important match in the battle for a top four place as London Wasps travel to Newcastle Falcons who surprised everyone on Sunday with a win over Leicester Tigers.

Current Form

·        Who would have thought it? Last weekend, after 7 successive defeats in the Guinness Premiership, Newcastle beat a Leicester Tigers side desperate for a win to keep their play-off hopes alive. At the same time, after 8 consecutive wins in the Guinness Premiership, London Wasps lost at home to Gloucester for the first time in league rugby.

·        Newcastle’s 28-25 victory against Leicester took them back above Worcester in the league and a win on Wednesday will see them move ahead of Bristol into 9^th place.

·        Newcastle have played 10 matches at home this season, winning 6 and losing 4.

·        The 25-17 defeat by Gloucester saw Wasps drop from 3^rd in the table to 5^th and they are unable to finish in first position this season. However, wins on Wednesday, and in their final game at Leeds on Saturday, can still see them grab the all-important home tie in the play-off, dependent on the outcome of the Gloucester v Bath match.

·        London Wasps have played 9 matches away from home this season, winning 4 losing 3 and drawing 2.

History

·        Newcastle and London Wasps have met 21 times in league rugby since 1998.

·        Newcastle have won 8 and Wasps 12 with 1 game ending in a draw.

·        Only once in 10 seasons has there been a league double in this fixture, when Wasps won both games in 2003/04.

·        Newcastle have won 7 of the 10 matches played at Kingston Park, including the last 3.

·        On 23^rd September 2000 Newcastle beat Wasps at Kingston Park 59-21, their heaviest defeat ever in Premiership rugby.

·        Wasps beat Newcastle at Adams Park 35-12 last November.

Trends and Trivia

·        Newcastle secured their 7^th win of the season last Sunday taking them above their record low of 6 in the Premiership in 1999/2000.

·        They also only won 7 and drew 2 in 2003/04 when they finished in 9^th place with 45 points. This season they have 34 points, the lowest number of points they have accumulated in a season since the introduction of 4 points for a win and bonus points in 2000/01 is 40 in 2002/03.

·        Newcastle have now scored 181 points at Kingston Park this season. They will need a big win on Wednesday to beat their previous lowest total of points at home in a Premiership season, 220 in 1999/00.

·        Having scored 3 tries against Leicester last Sunday, Newcastle have now equalled their worst return in a season, 31 in 2002/03.

·        They have still only managed 19 conversions this season though, still 4 behind their worst total of 23 in 1999/00.

·        Newcastle are the only team in the Premiership not to have attracted a five figure gate to one of their home matches this season. Their highest to date is the 9612 for the Gloucester match and the lowest the 5592 for the visit of Bath. The sell-out crowd on Wednesday will improve things.

·        With both teams having one home game left against London Wasps, Newcastle have attracted 72629 spectators to their 10 home matches this season and Leeds Carnegie 71779. A difference of 850 in favour of the Falcons.

·        Jonny Wilkinson has now scored 85 points for Newcastle this season and Tom May has scored 6 tries. May has also made most appearances for Newcastle in the Premiership, 19 from 20 matches.

·        The defeat by Gloucester last Sunday put an end to Wasps’ 8 match winning run in the Premiership. If they had managed to continue their run to the end of the season they would have beaten their best ever performance of winning 11 on the trot between November 2003 and April 2004.

·        The most consecutive number of wins in the top division of English rugby is 17 by Bath in 1993/93 through 1994/95.

·        When Wasps won their 3 consecutive Premierships in 2003/04/05 they finished second in the league table each time.

·        Wasps cannot finish top of the league this season. They have not finished to since 1996/97.

·        When Newcastle won 33-30 at Wasps in November 2001, Alex King scored a record 9 penalties and 27 points in a match for Wasps. Coincidentally, as happens this week, their following match was against Leeds and King set a new record of 29 points, which still stands.

·        London Wasps lost 3 matches at home this season. The last time they lost 3 at home was in season 2001/02.

·        Danny Cipriani has scored 176 points for Wasps in the Premiership this season. Cipriani and Sackey have both scored 6 tries. If Simon Shaw plays on Wednesday and Saturday he will become the first player in the history of the Premiership to appear in 200 matches.