Irish douse Dragons' fire

London Irish claimed a bonus point inside half an hour to maintain their 100 per cent record at the top of Pool One with a 45-17 victory over Newport/Gwent at Rodney Parade.

Four converted tries in the first 28 minutes killed off the Dragons before they had barely drawn breath and any possibility of a fiery afternoon for the visitors was extinguished.

Irish produced some impressive and vibrant attacking moves in that opening stanza but the defence from the Dragons was woeful and even half-hearted at times.

The Dragons did rally in the second half but by then the game was over as a meaningful contest - and with the bonus point in the bag there was little incentive for Irish to do anything other than keep their hosts at arm's reach.

The Dragons' bright start was a distant memory inside 20 minutes but they did look the better side for all of six minutes.

A superb length of the pitch handling move almost resulted in an early try only for Luke Charteris to be forced into touch at the corner.

The Dragons had a second chance to take an early lead only for Ceri Sweeney's kickable penalty to come back off an upright.

On seven minutes Sweeney was somewhat harshly penalised for a late hit on Peter Richards and Peter Hewat put Irish ahead.

Quality

For the next half an hour it was almost all one-way traffic with Irish creating and taking four top quality chances.

Deposed England scrum-half Richards was at the heart of most of the attacking moves and it was his dart which set up the overlap for Tomas de Vedia to go over in the corner.

Richards was at it again five minutes later, firing a superb long pass to Delon Armitage. He chipped over the top, Kevin Morgan missed the take and de Vedia collected for his second score.

More poor defence gifted Mike Catt a walk-in try as Tonga Lea'aetoa popped up a pass into the grateful arms of the veteran fly-half.

On 23 minutes the tide was briefly halted as Gloucester were penalised for not rolling away and Sweeney got Newport on the board.

Deluge

But on 28 minutes the deluge resumed as de Vedia collected a superbly-weighted Catt kick in the corner and sent Armitage over for the bonus-point score.

The Dragons did manage a close-range try from Michael Owen to give themselves just the glimmer of hope before the break, but that was quickly snuffed out seven minutes into the second half.

Sailosi Tagicakibau hacked on a loose ball, chased it and gave Nick Kennedy the chance to score in the corner. Hewat kicked his fifth straight conversion - this the most difficult from the touchline - and Irish led 38-10.

Steve Jones scored another close-range try for Newport on 68 minutes but it was almost inevitable that the Exiles would have the last word. It came when Armitage intercepted Andy Williams' pass and trotted in unopposed for his second try.

This group will almost certainly be decided by the forthcoming games between Irish and Perpignan. After this crushing home defeat, it will be difficult for the Dragons to force themselves into any sort of contention.