Former Harlequins winger Ugo Monye has called the club’s 48-0 defeat by Gloucester on Saturday “one of the worst performances I have ever seen”.

Quins conceded eight tries in their heaviest league defeat for 26 years and are bottom of the early Gallagher Prem table.

“They got smashed in the scrum and the line-out. Their backfield coverage was poor. They got smashed at the gain line,” Monye said on the Rugby Union Weekly podcast.

“They didn’t score a single point in a league where they’re literally handing out points for free [this season].”

Monye, who came through the Quins academy and played over 230 games for the London club, said the players and staff may find it hard to analyse the performance in training.

“I’d love to know, when they go into their meeting and they try and draw a line under it, where they try and begin”, he said.

“It was one of the worst performances I have ever seen in the Prem, by any team.

“Quins are the only club I ever played for. They’re in my heart. It’s so much easier if you can talk about them positively, but that’s been quite difficult to do.”

Harlequins finished in a lowly ninth in the Gallagher Prem last season, their worst finish in eight years, with Gloucester just above them.

But Monye said the result showed a contrast in how the two sides had gone about their summer recruitment, and suggested Quins had prioritised the marquee capture of Northampton full-back George Furbank over other areas.

“Gloucester said ‘we’ll have a World Cup winner in the second row, we’ll have a world-class hooker, we’ll have a world-class number seven’ – that’s money well spent,” said the former England and British and Irish Lions wing.

“Quins said ‘we’ll have a world-class [number] 15. That’s great, but first go and invest in your pack.

“They substituted the whole front row at half-time.”