Bristol sent toppling into abyss despite Short's heroics

London Irish 41 Bristol 21: West Country rivals suffer mixed fortunes but could learn today whether proposed merger will go ahead

A tragi-comedy, played out as a pentameter of five London Irish tries. When will these two meet again? "I don't know, nobody knows," said Agustin Pichot, who has been Bristol's scrum-half since he departed Richmond in 1999. "We've been waiting for four months to know what is happening. We'll know on Monday."

On the eve of the match, Pichot and his family visited the home of the club's chairman and owner, Malcolm Pearce. Apart from proving that Pearce was not in Spain, as had been reported, the meeting resolved little. "He was waiting for this match," Pichot said. "Relegation changes the parameters."

Pichot and his fly-half compatriot, Felipe Contepomi, are variously thought to have tied up deals at Leicester, Stade Français or somewhere else across Europe's professional landscape. Perhaps they could pitch up in the blue, black and white, more blue and more white of a Bath-Bristol merger.

They should, in short, be all right. Craig Short, the Bristol boy in the back row who scored two tries in defeat, is in as precarious a position as his political namesake, Clare. "It's the young lads I feel l sorry for," said Peter Thorburn, Bristol's head coach. "A lot of senior players have found other places to go."

Short's own verdict was simple and honest. "We deserve to go down, Rotherham deserve to come up." It's true. In sporting terms, Bristol have no redress against relegation. They knew the minimum requirement was to keep the scoreline close, and led 10-0 after Short's first try, and a penalty and conversion from Shane Drahm.

But Irish, pathologically afraid of the goalline for most of the season, suddenly discovered they liked the smell of whitewash. They had three tries by half-time, through Naka Drotske, Rob Hoadley and Geoff Appleford. When Paul Sackey hacked a loose ball fully 50 metres in the 65th minute, he sealed only their second try bonus in 22 games. Bristol, without seven injured forwards, could not cope. Michael Horak's try finished off an Irish performance worthy of the Premiership.

"I'm not ecstatic, we've been through a lot lately," was the immediate response of Conor O'Shea, Irish's managing director and erstwhile full-back, although his smile was broad enough a little later when he joined the party under the Madejski Stadium North Stand.

Here, in a breeze-block environment far removed from the club's spiritual home at Sunbury, the relieved majority raised three cheers for Bristol. And then another three for Brendan Venter, Irish's South African player-coach who is heading home to his medical practice on the Cape. "I've been around the England scene, and several clubs," said Mark Mapletoft, the 31-year-old fly-half who has kicked his age in points to help Irish win their last two matches, "and I've never come across any one with the passion of Brendan. We were bottom of the table at the start of May, but he pulled us through."

Irish could teach Antony Worrall-Thompson a thing or two about escapes. They avoided relegation by winning play-offs against Coventry and Rotherham in 1997 and 1998, and did the rest of the Premiership a favour by subsuming London Scottish and Richmond in 1999.

They must plug the gaps left by Venter and a quartet of departing forwards including Mike Worsley, who is joining Harlequins. In searching for a replacement prop, Irish could do worse than Andrew Sheridan, Bristol's converted lock. "I'm under contract for another year," said the 23-year-old National Academy player, "but they have a release clause, and I have a release clause."

Sheridan will summer with England, either on tour down under or at the Churchill Cup in Canada. Pichot and Contepomi have a World Cup with the Pumas to look forward to. Thorburn believes a consortium may emerge to keep Bristol, in some fashion, playing in Bristol.

Life, and rugby, goes on.

London Irish: Tries Drotske, Hoadley, Appleford, Sackey, Horak; Conversions Mapletoft 5; Penalties Mapletoft 2. Bristol: Tries Short 2; Conversion Drahm; Penalties Drahm 3.

London Irish: M Horak (E Thrower, 82); P Sackey, G Appleford, R Hoadley (B Everitt, 56), K Barrett; M Mapletoft, H Martens; M Worsley (N Hatley, 45), N Drotske (A Flavin, 80), R Hardwick (S Halford, 45), R Strudwick (capt), B Casey (K Roche, 72), D Danaher, C Sheasby, K Dawson.

Bristol: S Drahm; D Rees, A Higgins, D Gibson (capt), P Christophers; F Contepomi, A Pichot (P Hodgson, 80); A Sheridan, P Johnstone (S Nelson, 52), E Bergamaschi (R Skuse, 47), S Morgan, A Brown, C Short, R Oakley, M Lipman.

Referee: T Spreadbury (Somerset).