AN oldish gentleman was apparently fighting for his life after being involved in a car accident just outside Workington Town's Derwent Park towards the end of yesterday's match against York Wasps.

No, it had nothing to do with the rugby on the field, but it does put the result of the match into perspective.

In the grand scheme of things, a sound thrashing on a rugby field is not the be all and end all of everything.

The sun will still come up in the morning, people will still go to work, kids will still go to school, babies will be born, some folk will die, then the sun will go back down again.

The world keeps turning and the daily grind goes on. Unfortunately for some poor souls the particular daily grind involved in supporting York Wasps also goes on.

Yes, the Wasps did get a win last week, and the relief surrounding that victory over Chorley was so great you could almost touch it.

But what that win also did was disguise the truth, paper over the cracks.

It hid the fact that the Wasps aren't at present able to match it with the decent teams in the Northern Ford Premiership. They still make too many mistakes, they are still too sloppy, they still lack belief.

Last week's long-awaited victory also served to boost the hope that the Wasps might be able to compete in this game. Not necessarily win, but compete.

However, two tries in two minutes saw Town go 12-0 up with barely eight minutes on the clock and already the game was up.

Unfortunately, as we all know, this is nothing new. And, because of this fact, the apathy around the city which saw only 280 people turn up for that last home game is understandable, albeit disappointing.

Now, the players have shown at times this season that they have the ability to compete with sides like Workington; not necessarily sides that are pulling up trees in the NFP, but sides that will finish in the top nine.

When they do things right, they can hold their own. As they showed last week, they can also play some scintillating rugby.

But when they then do something wrong, it all goes to pot.

A dropped pass here, a missed tackle there, a penalty over in the corner and all of a sudden the opposition have three tries on the board and heads, as one would expect, go down.

For coach Leo Epifania, it was the same old story.

Too much dropped ball, too many penalties, too much loose tackling, too much too much.

In addition yesterday, a touch of farce was added when Ben Sorbello and Jon Liddell went for the same high ball and collided in mid-air, with Town picking up the pieces to score their tenth of 11 tries.

Of course, the Wasps were without Jamie Benn, Rob Lee and Shaun Austerfield, and they especially missed Benn's left boot, as their kicking game without him was at best woeful.

But that - along with the fact skipper Peter Edwards had to soldier on for the entire 80 minutes despite pulling up in the warm-up with a hamstring injury - merely proves how paper-thin the squad is.

Their tormentor-in-chief on this occasion was Kiwi scrum-half Tane Manihera, who, along with fellow half-back Martyn Wood, Town's new player-coach, ran the show.

Wood got on the scoresheet once, but Manihera helped himself to a hat-trick of tries and eight conversions. His tally of 28 points was not a club record but it must be somewhere near a personal best.

The other big scorer was centre Kevin Hetherington, who got two tries in either half and helped himself to a celebratory cigarette after the final hooter.

Other tries came from fellow centre Jamie Beaumont, winger Neil Frazer and second-row Stuart Hoyles, with the hosts racking up 30 points in either half.

The Wasps solitary reply came from Mark Cain on 21 minutes, a try which suggested York might make a go of it but which flattered to deceive.

It followed some superb keep-ball by the whole team which ended with Ian Kirke - who was again prominent in the second row - going close to the line, with Cain diving over from dummy half.

That passage of play, plus several others during the match, underlined the Wasps ability but also served to add to the general frustration of it all.

If they can be this good, why do they have to ruin it all by making so many errors?

As if to prove the point, Mick Docherty, who otherwise had a decent game in the front row, hit the kickable conversion against the post.

Still, when all is said and done, the Wasps will be favourites to get a win over Gateshead next week. Epifania's men might also play the kind of entertaining rugby they are capable of and, by this time next week, the smiles might have returned.

Workington:

T: Hetherington (6, 17, 59, 70), Frazer (8), Manihera (27, 47, 66), Beaumont (31), M Wood (43), Hoyles (50 C: Manihera 8

S Wood, Frazer, Hetherington, Beaumont, McGrady, M Wood, Manihera, Tunstall, Sice, Okesene, Hoyles,

Samuel, Charlton.

Subs (all used): Wright, Savelio, Rumney, Nixon.

Sin-binned: None

Sent off: None

York Wasps:

T: Cain (21)

C: None

P: None

Sorbello 6, Molloy 5, Moore 5, Hall 7, Deakin 5, Liddell 6, Cain 5, Docherty 7, Pallister 6, Hill 7, Kirke 7, Ramsden 6, Edwards 6.

Subs (all used): Precious 6, CRake 5, A Lee 6, Yeaman 6.

Sin-binned: None.

Sent off: None

HT: 30-4 Referee: Ian Smith (Oldham) Att: 858

Updated: 10:27 Monday, March 18, 2002