London Welsh given a rude awakening by Leicester on top flight debut

London Welsh 13-38 Leicester
Thomas Waldrom of Leicester charges upfield against London Welsh
Thomas Waldrom charges upfield against London Welsh. He scored two tries for Leicester. Photograph: David Rogers/Getty Images

At half-time London Welsh paraded some of their internationals from the early 1970s, the most successful period in the club's history. They might have been tempted to supply them with kit 20 minutes in as Leicester, remorselessly exploiting weaknesses and mistakes, mauled their way into a 17-point lead and graphically highlighted the difference between Premiership and Championship rugby.

It was the Exiles' first appearance in the top flight and their reward for taking on the authorities and winning an appeal against a decision to exclude them from the Premiership because they did not meet the criteria was first to meet last season's beaten finalists and then, after a short turnaround, to travel to the champions, Harlequins, on Friday. A hot, rather than a warm, welcome, but if the question after the first of Thomas Waldrom's tries 13 minutes in was how many Leicester would win by, London Welsh were not outgunned but out-manoeuvred.

They struggled to cope with Leicester's driving lineout, something sides with vastly more Premiership experience over the years have found more difficult to grasp than quantum physics, and their lineout was a useful source of possession for the opposition, but what will give London Welsh encouragement at the start of what will be the longest of campaigns for them was that they did not buckle physically and they kept their line intact in the final quarter.

Leicester had by then settled for a bonus-point victory, although two of their three tries in the second half looked the product of suspiciously forward passes, Anthony Allen's to Geoff Parling 90 seconds after the restart and Scott Hamilton's to his fellow wing Vereniki Goneva on the hour. As the match was being televised live, the video official could have been summoned to adjudicate, but no London Welsh player complained to the referee, in contrast to the instant reaction of the Tigers' captain, Geordan Murphy, when Hudson Tonga'uiha claimed London Welsh's second try, which was awarded after being referred upstairs.

"The best rugby players in the world are thinkers, not those who are the quickest or the most skilful," said the London Welsh head coach, Lyn Jones. "It was not for me to judge whether a pass was a yard forward and it did not affect the outcome of the match. The devil is in the detail and we did not have enough time to put instinct into players: today is the end of the start. I do not want to sound like Winston Churchill, but we have foundations to build on."

London Welsh's fate will be determined not by how they fare against the likes of Leicester and Harlequins but by their results against clubs who inhabit the bottom half of the table with them. They were more imaginative than the Tigers, even without the injured Gavin Henson, but given that the team had been assembled in a hurry – only five of the players who started last May's play-off final second leg against Cornish Pirates took the field on Sunday – there was a predictable lack of precision and cohesion.

Leicester's first try came from a limp clearance from the London Welsh scrum-half Jonah Holmes that gave Murphy the opportunity to counterattack and the second, also scored by Waldrom, followed further failures by the home side to take play out of their own half and they then twice failed to deal with driving mauls.

London Welsh did reduce Leicester's lead to 17-10 by half-time, Tom Arscott evading Julian Salvi's tackle to score in the corner before Tonga'uiha helped himself to the ball as it squirted out of a ruck, but having fought so hard top get back into the game, they handed back seven points at the start of the second period when they failed to deal with the kick-off and the Tigers worked enough space after three drives for the ubiquitous Parling to score on the left wing.

The crowd was far from capacity, not least because of some problems with a new ticketing system, and a few thousand were in Leicester colours. Any hope the home faithful took from a Gordon Ross penalty evaporated almost immediately when Welsh again squandered possession and Toby Flood sidestepped behind the defence at the start of a move Salvi finished.

Goneva's debut try on the hour finished the scoring but London Welsh had the satisfaction of repelling a series of Leicester scrum drives in the closing minutes. They had held up well in the tight, even though their new French recruit, Franck Montanella, had looked oxygen starved very early on, and although the Exiles lack resources, they showed they will be resourceful.

London Welsh Arscott (Scott, 76); Mackenzie, Parker, Tonga'uiha, Ajuwa; Ross (Jewell, 71), Holmes (Runciman, 50); Montanella (Bristow, 56), Briggs, Ion (Joly, 74), Mills (capt), Kulemin (Purdy, 56), Williamson (To'oala, 45), Beach (Bateman, 56), Browne.

Tries: Arscott, Tonga'uiha. Pen Ross.

Leicester Murphy (capt); Hamilton, Tuilagi, Allen, Goneva; Flood (Ford, 65), Young (Harrison, h-t); Mulipola (Stankovich, 53), T Youngs (Chuter, 59), Cole (Castrogiovanni, 53), Andrew, Parling, Mafi (B Deacon, 65), Salvi, Waldrom (Crane, 55).

Tries Waldrom 2, Parling, Salvi, Goneva. Cons Flood 5. Pen Flood.

Referee J P Doyle (London). Attendance 6,850.