Northampton Saints: Alex Waller apologises for 'dreadful' display at Newcastle Falcons

Sonatane Takulua celebrates one of his three tries for Newcastle Falcons against Northampton Saints

Northampton Saints prop Alex Waller has apologised to supporters for their "dreadful" second-half performance against Newcastle Falcons on Sunday.

Saints led 24-15 at the break, but a series of defensive and handling errors in the second period allowed Newcastle to turn the game around and win 46-31.

"It was not the performance we were after, after such a strong start in the first half," said 27-year-old Waller.

"We need to go and look at ourselves in the mirror."

Newcastle, aided by a hat-trick from scrum-half Sonatane Takulua, moved above Northampton to seventh in the Premiership table, and Saints are without an away win in six games in all competitions.

Director of rugby Jim Mallinder has said his side need to improve defensively, and admitted the top four "looks a fair way away".

And Waller told BBC Radio Northampton: "We played into their hands a bit, we didn't need to play a loose, expansive game, we just needed to play and we got dragged into playing a loose game, and they're very good at that."

"We can only apologise to the fans, that's not what we expect from ourselves and I'm sure they expect more from us as well.

"Rest assured we're all hurting a lot more than anyone else would think - there's plenty to work on on Tuesday morning."