Wasps growing into new Coventry home

Wasps continue to enjoy life at their new Coventry home as they beat Sale 41-16 at the Ricoh Arena to move into the top five of the Aviva Premiership.

The home side were outstanding as they ran in five tries - two of them from scrum-half Joe Simpson - to follow up a 48-16 rout of London Irish with another dominant performance.

They were watched by an impressive crowd numbering 15,343 who were richly entertained, Wasps converting a 27-9 lead at the break into a convincing win at full-time.

Sale went into the match on the back of six straight wins over Wasps and had won four of their last five Premiership matches but those runs came to an end.

The first try of the game came from James Haskell after Andy Goode and Joe Ford - chosen ahead of Sale's former Wasps man Danny Cipriani - had traded penalties.

Two more Ford penalties kept Sale in touch before Wasps capitalised on their dominance to move well clear.

Nathan Hughes crossed for their second try midway through the first half, Goode added a drop goal and Simpson scored his first.

The bonus point was secured early in the second half when Simpson scored again and although Sale threw on Cipriani and Mark Cueto in a bid to get back into the game, it was to no avail.

Wasps responded with their fifth try when flanker Ashley Johnson crossed and Goode kicked a fifth conversion to take his points tally to 16 before being replaced.

Sale grabbed a late try through Andrei Ostrikov which was converted by Cipriani and although Wasps had James Gaskell sin-binned late on, there was no way back for the visitors.