Opposition view: Exeter boss Baxter 'a bit annoyed and angry' with himself

Exeter pushed Phil Dowson's men all the way and the match was level at 28-28 going into the final seconds.

But Fin Smith popped up with a fantastic finish to ensure Saints secured a dramatic 35-28 Gallagher PREM win at Sandy Park.

It stretched table-topping Saints' advantage over fourth-placed Exeter to 10 points in the league standings.

And Baxter, who had said before the match that it was a fixture Exeter had been looking forward to for some time, was left to rue a game that he felt got away because of the nervousness in the home team.

"We just made too many mistakes," Baxter said.

"I'm probably a bit annoyed and angry with myself because we got everything physicallly we wanted from the lads.

"We talked about turning up, how we hit the pitch, our attitude, our emotion, and we got all that, but I think we were nervous, which is good in a lot of ways, but we were nervous because we knew it was an important opportunity to put a bit of a marker down for the season, and I don't think that brought the best out of us.

"We just made some errors that seemed small errors and not under pressure.

"Fair play to Northampton because when they're tackling us, they're getting the ball back, those are pressure errors, but we made quite a lot of non-pressure errors, just dropping the ball or not quite getting into shape or getting the movement or that bit of chat.

"Defensively, when we were down to 14 men we piled into a few breakdowns, we didn't really get our back field organised and that's the frustration for me because I think we could have got them into a better emotional state to allow them to play a bit better so I'm a bit frustrated with that and I feel a bit for the lads because they've put an awful amount of effort into the game and they've come up a bit short.

"We still got two points out of the game against a very good side who are playing well and who are in a bit of flow, so overall it's a bit of a positive for us but a bit of a frustration that we haven't got more out of the game.

"There's loads of areas in there where we've been really competitive. Steve Varney comes up with a couple of try-saving tackles on the line and little bits and pieces.

"We're getting there.

"Northampton are a very good side and I've said to the coaches in the office 'how different does it feel this year that we're frustrated that we haven't beaten Northampton, who we know are a very good side and who are expected to be in the latter stages of this competition?'.

"Last year, we weren't even competitive in some of those fixtures but now we're there and it's nice to be frustrated that we're not winning."