Tom French has been hailed as a small prop with a massive future after his remarkable Heineken Cup final performance against Leicester - and one of the world’s foremost tight-heads in Julian White.

At one stage French, who was not included in the starting XV until Sunday morning, seemed to be mocking White as the Wasps pack took full control in the surprise 25-9 win against a Tigers side hunting down the third trophy of an unprecedented treble.

The 23-year-old is still an academy player at Wasps and spent nine months of the season on loan at Henley before breaking into the first team to make his first senior start in one of the biggest club matches of all time.

Wasps flanker Joe Worsley said: “He was incredible. I was amazed. He was probably my man of the match. No-one had ever played with him before - he had never played a proper game for the first team.

“He was up against Julian White, the best tight-head prop in the world on his day. French is not a big guy by any means but he got the technique right and he has got massive future if he carries on playing like that.”

French, a member of the England Under-21 squad that won the Grand Slam in 2004, only stands 5ft 11in but is rated as one of the strongest players in the Wasps squad.

He is a seemingly permanent fixture in the gym at Wasps’ Acton training ground and his hero is the club’s conditioning coach Paul Stridgen.

Wasps had three weeks off before the final after failing to qualify for the Premiership play-offs so organised an internal match - the first XV against the ‘A’ side. French packed down against Phil Vickery in that match and caused enough problems to convince forward coach Craig Dowd to take the chance.

“Julian White is probably one of the most destructive scrummagers in the world so for an academy prop to come in and play like that was huge,” said Dowd, the former New Zealand prop.

“He’d not even played in a Guinness Premiership game. Vicks got to mark him during a couple of the scrummaging sessions and he had Vicks on a couple of occasions. Vicks said ‘this kid isn’t too bad’. Having a world-class tight-head prop saying he can do the job gives you confidence.”

Victory saw Wasps crowned European champions for the second time in four seasons and the end of Leicester’s dreams of a trophy treble.

The Londoners entered the game as underdogs but it turned out to be their sixth straight Twickenham final victory and, as one sponsorship board declared, “Wasps are dangerous this time of year”.

Worsley said: “I was always confident we could do it. When it comes to the finals we are very hard nosed.

“I am not fussed with being tagged favourites or underdogs. Nor is the club. The press and public are often very reactive to things. Last weekend Leicester dominated Gloucester to win the Guinness Premiership title. But we are a different team to Gloucester. You can never ever call a two-horse race like that.”

Fraser Waters, the official man of the match for his ferocious tackling and the manner in which he led Wasps’ red-hot blitz defence, took up the theme.

He said: “I watched the FA Cup final on Saturday and thought ‘I don’t want to be Manchester United’ (who lost to a late Chelsea goal).

“I have been lucky enough to win every final since I have been at Wasps but it looks like losing one is an horrendous feeling and I don’t want to go through that.

"It feels better to win the trophy a second time. The first time you don’t really appreciate it enough. The second time you appreciate what it takes.”