I think a Base in LGW is not to far away either. A while back Ryanair said they would move rotues from LSTN to LGW and they have.
Your logic doesn't follow. Big market but little room in the morning to get the based aircraft away between the based EZY, BA and IT madness. The FR slots at LGW work quite well on W patterns. Can't see them basing there but that's not the same thing as saying they won't grow the business big time at LGW.