Wasps vs Gloucester: Wasps masterclass puts Elliot Daly in England frame

Wasps 23 Gloucester 3: Daly kicked two wide-angled penalties from his own half, hitting the spot as easily as Phil Mickelson finds the green with a pitching wedge

Gloucester wing David Halaifonua, left, is shown a red card for an illegal tackle on Wasps lock Bradley Davies (PA)

New Zealand triumph over Australia in a captivating World Cup final; Steve Hansen, Michael Cheika, Eddie Jones, Warren Gatland and Vern Cotter finish the global tournament so far ahead of the game, their fellow coaches can barely see them without a telescope; Daniel Carter and Matt Giteau prove conclusively – even to the boneheaded English – that rugby union is an artistic endeavour as well as a scientific one...right now, it’s all about the Antipodeans. Even Antipodeans whose Test futures are miles behind them, or who never made it internationally in the first place.

Take the much decorated George Smith and the uncapped Willi Heinz as examples. Smith, who played a World Cup final for Australia a dozen years ago, is now deep in his 36th year, yet the energy he brought to the Wasps back-row effort here would have put a teenager to shame. His performance was remarkably rich in its diversity: the veteran breakaway ran enough clever angles to have finished the game with a degree in geometry, passed the ball with a purposeful simplicity that would have had the supremely intelligent All Black centre Conrad Smith nodding his head in acknowledgement and won any number of turnovers on the back foot. But for David Pocock, Michael Hooper, Sean McMahon and Liam Gill – a ridiculously good quartet of Wallaby scavengers – he would still be wearing the green and gold.

Heinz, meanwhile, is still just about on the right side of 30 – no sense of the Heinz Has-Beenz about this fellow – and on this showing, the New Zealander will be worth his weight in something extremely valuable to Gloucester this term. When the snap, crackle and pop half-back from Christchurch replaced Greig Laidlaw towards the end of the third quarter, the West Countrymen quickly found themselves in an ascendancy that was reflected everywhere but on the scoreboard. Laidlaw is no mean performer, but the Scotland captain would be the first to agree that he now has some serious competition for the No 9 shirt.

So where did all this leave the home-grown contingent? In fairness, the game was not an entirely dispiriting experience for those in the red-rose hierarchy who, after suffering the full range of Dante-esque horrors at Test level, are now turning to the domestic scene in search of solace. There was a passionate performance in adversity from Billy Twelvetrees, one of the England midfielders stripped bare by those coaches who were fooled by Sam Burgess and his “Emperor’s New Clothes”, and there was something even better from the Wasps centre Elliot Daly, who played like a dream for an hour and secured the spoils for his side in the process.

Daly kicked two wide-angled penalties from his own half, hitting the spot as easily as Phil Mickelson finds the green with a pitching wedge. He also knocked over a third kick from 45 metres – mere putting range, apparently – and cut the line into the Gloucester 22 that allowed Christian Wade to finish with a flourish at the sticks. As his defensive game, so important to the English mindset, was also up to scratch, there was every reason to think he might feature in the Six Nations squad, whenever and by whoever it is eventually named.

According to David Young, the Wasps boss, Daly is pulling his game together rather nicely. “On his own admission, he’s been guilty in the past of trying to throw the miracle ball at the wrong moment,” Young said. “I can swallow the 50-50 passes but when it’s 70-30 against, it’s probably not the right thing to do. He’s working hard on that side of his rugby and in this match, he drew opponents well, tackled heavily and kicked excellently from long range.” In other words, he pressed more right buttons in 62 minutes than the England midfield pushed at their own global tournament.

There was also much to admire from the Fijian No 8 Nathan Hughes, who qualifies as an Englishman for rugby purposes at the end of the season and already looks like a quicker, more dynamic version of Billy Vunipola. Hughes took a smack to the head in trying to interrupt Richard Hibbard’s entertaining impersonation of a stampeding buffalo and played little further part, but he did more than enough to suggest that come the autumn internationals this time next year, he will be in the red-rose squad.

Mind you, that wholly legitimate blow inflicted by Hibbard was as nothing compared to the spectacularly illegal one perpetrated by the Gloucester wing David Halaifonua on poor Bradley Davies, who was banjaxed early in the second half. The Tongan was shown a straight red by the referee Ian Tempest, who also took the crimson route when the Wasps prop Lorenzo Cittadini was spotted punching Twelvetrees, rather half-heartedly, from a horizontal position at the bottom of a ruck. To his credit, Twelvetrees attempted to talk Tempest out of the decision, but his argument fell on deaf ears.

By that time, Gloucester were dead and buried, partly because their England wing Jonny May shoved Wade in the back as he sought to claim a high ball: hardly a logical action, given that Wade is the shortest wing in Christendom. Wasps banged the ball to the corner, drove the line-out maul and were rewarded with a penalty try. And they say rugby is a thinking man’s game!

Scorers: Wasps: Tries: Wade, Penalty try. Conversions: Jackson 2. Penalties: Daly 3. Gloucester Penalty: Laidlaw.

Wasps: C Piutau; C Wade (McIntyre 79), E Daly (S Tagicakibau 62), B Jacobs, F Halai; R Jackson, J Simpson (D Robson 64); S McIntyre (T Bristow 68), C Festuccia (A Johnson 51), L Cittadini (J Cooper-Woolley 51-60), J Launchbury (Gaskell 62) , B Davies (Gaskell 45-51), J Haskell (capt), G Smith, N Hughes (G Thompson 54-60 and 64).

Gloucester: C Sharples; D Halaifonua, B Twelvetrees (capt), J Hook, J May; B Burns (H Purdy 45), G Laidlaw (W Heinz 56); P McAllister (Y Thomas 52), R Hibbard (C Brooker 76), J Afoa (P Doran-Jones 62), T Savage, E Stooke, S Kalamafoni (R Moriarty 52), M Kvesic, B Morgan (J Rowan 64).

Referee: I Tempest (Liverpool).