Tom Rees today admitted London Wasps had become a "shadow" of the team that had won the Guinness Premiership title last season after a desperately disappointing 11-10 home loss to Worcester.

Wasps have lost their opening two league matches, in stark contrast to Harlequins who lead the table despite being without Nick Evans, their All Black No10, who could be missing for six weeks with knee ligament damage.

The Wasps season could be further complicated by a knee injury suffered by Simon Shaw, the vastly experienced England lock, who will have the joint scanned today.

Rees is adamant Wasps can return to winning ways but admitted: "After the first defeat, we went away and said we wouldn't throw our toys out of the pram having been a shadow of the team we normally are and this week we were miles ahead in terms of endeavour and effort but we were, in rugby terms, as bad or at times, even worse.

"We went from the sublime to the absolutely terrible in the space of one move and it's all down to the players. It's us knocking balls on and it's important we don't lose our heads, but at the same time what we have produced is unacceptable.

"As players we have to hold our hands up and admit we have been at times stupid in terms of the penalties given away. To still be giving a whole batch of them in the 80th minute is just crazy.

"The fact that we have, in previous years, come back from bad starts and still been in the mix at the end of the season, counts for nothing. It's about the here and now and it gets harder every year in the Premiership.

"It will be difficult this week because there will be a lot of anger and that is a good thing as long as we channel it properly in the right direction. If we allow frustration to build up then it will only makes things worse."

Harlequins moved to the top with a 31-13 win over Bristol but London Irish fell 24-22 against Leicester and Saracens were edged out by a late drop goal at Sale losing 18-15 .

Fit-again Jonny Wilkinson scored 22 points in Newcastle's 32-22 win over Northampton.