Aviva Premiership round-up: Harlequins handle Warriors with Danny Care

Harlequins guaranteed themselves a place in the Aviva Premiership play-offs after England scrum-half Danny Care claimed a hat-trick in a 42-26 win away to Worcester Warriors.

Nick Evans, Tom Williams and Mike Brown also scored tries for the London side, who remain in third place and in contention for home advantage in the semi-finals. Evans was in fine form with the boot as well, kicking three conversions and two penalties as the visitors showed too much quality for the Warriors.

Struggling Worcester fought valiantly at the end of a week during which they parted company with their coach, Richard Hill. Chris Pennell and Alex Grove registered their tries while Andy Goode, the fly-half who was playing in his last game at Sixways ahead of a summer move to Wasps, kicked 16 points in total. With Care in such fine form, Quins will be confident of beating Northampton in their final match ahead of the play-offs.

For their part, the Saints also have reasons for optimism having secured their semi-final place with a 47-7 thrashing of Sale Sharks at Franklin's Gardens last night. The seven-try, bonus-point rout saw Jamie Elliott and James Wilson score two tries each, with Luther Burrell, Lee Dickson and Tom Wood also going over.

At the other end of the table, London Irish claimed a bonus point with a 45-28 win against London Welsh in the battle of the bottom two at the Madejski Stadium. The visitors, who are already relegated, recovered from an early Guy Armitage try to take the lead through tries from Seb Stegmann and Nick Scott.

But the momentum then shifted back in favour of the Irish thanks to two tries from their prop Halana Aulika either side of half-time, while Chris Hala'ufia also crossed. Two penalties from Gordon Ross reduced the deficit, but Sailosi Tagicakibau, Matt Garvey and Armitage crushed any hope of a revival before Greg Bateman claimed a consolation try.