Thompson shows signs of strain as Bristol slide

Bristol 19 Wasps 34

If Bristol never play another match at the Memorial Ground, their home for more years than the greyest of their greybeards would care to remember, they will not weep too many tears at the passing of a very long era; indeed, they will probably experience the kind of relief felt by a single woman extricating herself the Bates Motel with her component parts intact. The place has become a millstone, a morgue, a mansion of misery. The sooner they pack their bags and go, the happier they will be.

Sadly for a once great club fallen on the least forgiving of hard times, there may be other passings of a less joyous nature. "You won't have to put up with me for much longer," pronounced Peter Thorburn, the former All Blacks selector who succeeded Dean Ryan as head coach last summer. "That's not an abdication speech, by the way. It's just reality." And by the time Thorburn departs, Bristol may have departed the Premiership. They copped a six-try walloping from Wasps yesterday – entirely in keeping with the 23 tries they conceded in their previous four league matches – and are now bottom of the pile, behind London Irish on points difference. A 54-point difference, to be precise.

Thoroughly depressed following Wednesday night's defeat at Northampton, the New Zealander cut a desolate figure as he addressed this latest stage in the collapse of his sporting world. "The older I get, the less I understand," he groaned. "Other clubs have problems, I guess, but I hope for their sakes that they're not as bad as ours." Asked whether the chronic uncertainty surrounding the club's financial and competitive future was making life impossible, he shook his head and replied succinctly: "I don't want to get into that shit." It is fair to suggest that Job had a better time of it than Thorburn.

Bristol were always in danger of being run ragged by an adventurous Wasps side enjoying a molten streak, so it was hardly necessary for the West Countrymen to invent a new way of losing a game. There is no end to their genius for self-destruction, though. Two points up at the interval, they were three points down within seconds of the resumption when Rhys Oakley, their spirited young No 8, made such an unholy mess of trapping Alex King's kick-off with his right foot that he looked like Norman Hunter on a really bad day. The ball cannoned off his ankle and bounced into the forwards in front of him, putting them miles offside. From the penalty line-out, Paul Volley crossed to signal the commencement of the slaughter.

"Rhys was concussed, but we didn't know it," said Thorburn, to general astonishment. "It's the only explanation, because he doesn't usually do things like that. The ball was there to be caught." Thorburn went on to reveal that Oakley had suffered a crack on the head during the first half, but had shown no sign of undue suffering during the interval. Maybe the medical staff are as confused as the coach these days.

Wasps scored two more tries during the third quarter, Josh Lewsey and Mark van Gisbergen capitalising on wonderful long-range breaks in which Stuart Abbott, a real handful in midfield, was heavily implicated. They then rubbed it in with another couple in the last five minutes, the first from Ayoola Erinle after terrific work from John Rudd and Phil Greening, the second a close-range stretch-over from Joe Worsley. All Bristol could muster was a soft injury-time reply from Brendon Daniel, which was barely worth the effort.

It was difficult not to feel sorry for the more able performers in Bristol colours – Andrew Sheridan and Alex Brown, Michael Lipman and Daryl Gibson. Sheridan, the newly anointed member of the front-row congregation, was a revelation, while Brown made a mockery of England's decision not to include him among the eight locks in the élite squad named last week. There again, it is impossible to defend a side guilty of fielding an outside-half as patently unfit as Felipe Contepomi. His selection said everything that needed saying about the depth of Bristol's desperation.

Bristol: Try Daniel. Conversion Drahm. Penalties Drahm 4. Wasps: Tries Abbott, Volley, Lewsey, Van Gisbergen, Erinle, Worsley. Conversions King 2.

Bristol: S Drahm; B Daniel, P Christophers, D Gibson, L Best (J Willams, 63); F Contepomi, A Pichot; A Sheridan, S Nelson (P Johnston, 69), R Skuse, G Archer (capt), A Brown, M Salter (S Morgan, 76), M Lipman, R Oakley (C Short, 58).

Wasps: M Van Gisbergen (K Logan, 61); J Lewsey, S Abbott (M Denney, 76), A Erinle, J Rudd; A King, R Howley (M Wood, 67); C Dowd (A McKenzie, 76), T Leota (P Greening, 61), W Green, S Shaw, R Birkett, J Worsley, P Volley (M Lock, 76), L Dallaglio (P Scrivener, 76).

Referee: C White (Gloucestershire).