Opposition view: Skivington gives credit to Saints after Gloucester are beaten

Skivington saw his side suffer a 31-26 defeat as they shipped four tries on home soil.

It leaves the Cherry and Whites stuck at the bottom of the Gallagher Premiership standings, while Saints moved up to sixth.

And Skivington said: "Fair play to Northampton - they did some bits really well: they frustrated our set piece, which has been a real area of strength for us, and they obviously put a lot of work into targeting it.

"It was just disappointing we let them do such a good job on us, but fair play to them on that front.

"The good side of it was that we did manage the game better.

"Willi Heinz brought some composure and Lloyd (Evans) was doing that as well before he got hurt, but it was just the execution from us, a couple of kicks to the corner not quite right.

"Saints targeted our set piece, we got a bit flustered and that took away our momentum, especially in the first half when they took our lineout away.

"We're obviously not as good as we thought we were in that set piece area so we'll just have to fix it up and get on with it."