Gloucester boss George Skivington feels Saturday's 28-14 defeat at Saints will prove to be a beneficial lesson for his side.

The Cherry and Whites had moved into a 14-0 lead during a dominant opening 30 minutes at DPD Stadium at Franklin's Gardens, but Saints then scored 28 unanswered points to win it.

Gloucester had come into Gallagher PREM round five sitting top of the table, having already beaten Exeter Chiefs, Harlequins and Bath.

But Saints refused to let them prevail at the Gardens, rolling up their sleeves to secure an important bonus-point success.

"In the second half, it was scrappy and I thought Saints' defence was outstanding to limit our opportunities," Skivington said.

"We weren't accurate enough but give credit to Saints because they did a great job in that second half and we couldn't quite get a foothold in the game to use our bench the way we wanted to.

"We missed our opportunity with that momentum in the first half to really give ourselves a shot at winning.

"Right now, I'm disappointed we took nothing from this game. That's my feeling.

"As a starting block it's been pretty good and probably playing Saints away, maybe in a week or so I'll think it's good it is the last game (before the break from league action) because it gives us a real opportunity to look at the fact we've come to the best team in the country away from home and we've fallen short so where have we fallen short? What do we need to do better?

"It's been a positive start and I think our game plan is in a good place.

"The lads are really tight, they're working really hard but we've got a lot of work to do.

"We've actually got a week without a game next week so it will give us an opportunity to look at that and work out where we need to go.

"Of all the games, this is probably going to be the best to analyse to see where we want to go.

"As a cohesive unit going after a different game plan, we're in a good spot, but not quite good enough to beat Saints yet.

So where did Skivington think it went wrong for his side in the second half?

"We played a lot in the middle of the field and didn't really break Saints so that might be something we have to have a look at in terms of how much we did play and whether we needed to kick the ball a bit earlier or whether our shape wasn't right in the middle of the field," the Gloucester boss said.

"It felt to me that every time we had the ball in the middle of the field during the second half, we were sort of zig-zagging across the field and eventually, if you do that enough, Saints turn the ball over or we make a mistake and they're in the 22.

"It's tricky to answer it right now but we need to find a way to be more accurate, whether that's playing more, playing less - at the moment I think we just looked a little bit lost in those moments."