Jeremy Guscott column

Former Bath, England & Lions centre

So Wasps go down to their third successive defeat - their worst start to the season since the Premiership began.

Ian McGeechan has plenty to keep him occupied over the next few months

But knowing (director of rugby) Ian McGeechan, he won't be panicking just yet. They had a similar start to the season last year - and look how they finished that.

Wasps are a team with too much talent not to click - it's just a matter of time. You can't write off Wasps until it is mathematically impossible.

The most disappointing aspect of their 24-20 defeat by Northampton from Geech's and Shaun Edwards's perspective was they had been in a position to win the game. You don't expect sides like Wasps to miss out on these opportunities, especially against a newly promoted team.

But it's worth examining their only try, scored by centre Dominic Waldouck.

It epitomised what Wasps are all about; there were dummy runners, players running into space, as well as pinpoint execution. The capability is there without a doubt.

But right now, there is a definite loss of confidence and belief.

What they had in the past was bags of experience with people like Fraser Waters and Lawrence Dallaglio.

So much is made of defence, I think Waters added more than that, as pointed out by Matty3891 on my 606 questions last week. Waters was not only their leader in defence, but also in attack.

I'm not writing off Wilkinson by any stretch of the imagination

No matter what sort of sticky situation they were in, the likes of James Haskell or Danny Cipriani could look to the senior stalwarts for guidance.

At the moment they are relying on someone like Josh Lewsey, who is one of their leaders, but on this weekend's performance he certainly wasn't.

Edwards needs to build that confidence back up again. But when you have a squad full of so much talent, that shouldn't be too difficult.

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I copped a bit of flak from 606 users about my column last week about Jonny Wilkinson.

Let me make this clear - the Wilkinson era is not over. However, he does have more competition than he did before 2003.

I would never write Wilkinson off - if he plays well, England manager Martin Johnson will be hard pushed to ignore him.

606: DEBATE Ask your questions here

But at the moment I think Toby Flood offers you another dimension at fly-half than Wilkinson, which is why I would have the Leicester man at 10 for England.

Having said that, the former Newcastle man did miss a tackle in Leicester's 19-17 win over Worcester which led to a try, the sort of tackle I would expect Jonny to make.

Those sort of mistakes lose games, especially at international level. So I'm not writing off Wilkinson by any stretch of the imagination.

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Jeremy takes time out each week to answer questions from users on 606:

Can we have your thoughts on England/Lions centres? Do you think Riki Flutey is a shoo-in for inside centre for England (and possibly for the Lions)? Also, what is your view of Jordan Turner-Hall at Quins? Will Greenwood rates him and I wondered what you thought of him.
CharmingJamesMacc

If Flutey plays as well as he did last season, he's going to get very close to the England and Lions squad.

But right now, England have a plethora of good centres. The likes of Ollie Barkley, Dan Hipkiss, Mathew Tait, Jamie Noon as well as emerging talent like Jon Clarke at Northampton are all in contention.

So Turner-Hall will have to develop quickly if he wants to get into the England side - let alone the Lions side. He's young, he's certainly big enough and he's difficult to bring down.

Jordan Turner-Hall will have to prove himself this season

But to make a real impact, he'll have to run through people, score tries and make the biggest tackles we have ever seen. That will be his only way of making his mark in the Premiership and catching the eyes of the England selectors.

I have an old-fashioned view of a centre pairing - basically, one big one and one small one. But with the experimental law variations, there seems to be a lot of kicking right now - which plays into Olly Barkley's hands.

Barkley gives you that other kicking option that Flutey can't. I would pick Barkley over Flutey, but if the Wasps centre's season is anything like last season, it will be a nice headache for Martin Johnson.

Jeremy Guscott was talking to BBC Sport's Pranav Soneji