Mallinder's men wilted under a second-half Newcastle onslaught to lose their first league game of the season at Kingston Park 32-22.

Mallinder was a frustrated man after seeing his side control a scrappy first-half to go in 12-6 up and then throw it away.

Despite a superb Sean Lamont try, it all unravelled in the second half and Mallinder said: "We have very quickly learned that at this level if you make mistakes you get punished and Newcastle did that very well to us.

"You know when Jonny is on the field he will make you pay for any mistakes and he certainly did that. We had a chance going into the break ahead, but we didn't deserve to win in the end and it was a fair result."

Things started to go wrong for Saints when Dylan Hartley had a madcap moment on half-time.

The hooker decided against an easy three points to extend Saints' lead to nine and took a tap-penalty that went nowhere instead, much to the annoyance of his team-mates.

Mallinder said: "It was an interesting decision and if they come off it is the right decision, but if they don't then it is the wrong decision.

"It wasn't just that to be honest, we didn't play very well in the second half."