Year Summary 2004
The season 2003/04 for London Wasps will be described as one of the all time greats. The season started with five members of the squad being selected for the Rugby World Cup in Australia. The players returned as heroes and found that the players who had filled in for them while on international duty had secured a top-three league position.
Lawrence Dallaglio was appointed the England captain after Martin Johnson's retirement and the club moved up a gear in the quest for European and domestic glory. Wins in the Heineken Cup over Perpignan, Celtic Warriors, Calvisano and Gloucester secured a semi-final against Munster at Lansdowne Road.
In front of 45,000 Munster fans, Warren Gatland's side came back from 10-points down to win the match in the dying moments of the game and in doing so secured a place in the final against the reining champions Toulouse.
The final itself was of a Test match standard. At 20-points all, Rob Howley scored one of the most opportunist tries in the history of the competition and in doing so, brought the Heineken Cup Trophy to the club for the first time.
Six days later, Wasps were at Twickenham again defending their Zurich Premiership title. Wasps came away 10-6 winners and secured a remarkable `double'. The game itself was a tense affair and a Stuart Abbott try was the difference between the sides.
The season also saw the emergence of a number of young and exciting players for next season. Jonny O'Connor arrived from Connacht and in the short time he played, the Irishman made in incredible impact in the league. The flanker was named Zurich Premiership Player for the month of December.
However, an Achilles injury, sadly brought an abrupt end to his season. Martin Purdy and George Skivington also made massive inroads into the first team and look set for a bright future with the club.
Awards were handed out to Simon Shaw and Mark Van Gisbergen who won the Zurich Premiership Player of the season and Whyte and MacKay supporters' player of the season awards respectively.
In a season that saw the Black & Gold Army take everything on offer, they also took up a number of places on the June summer tours with England. Eight Wasps players would go down to New Zealand and Australia while four would be off to Canada on the Churchill Cup tour.
2003/04 from a London Wasps perspective will go down as `The greatest'.
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