Director of rugby Martin Jones took plenty of positives out of London Welsh's 44-11 defeat at Northampton on Saturday, writes Damian Dolan.

In front of a crowd of more than 11,000, Welsh trailed by just four points at the break and it wasn't until the hour mark that the hosts started to pull away.

Welsh scored one try when Gareth Morgan's kick bounced wickedly and Paul Sampson was on hand to scurry down the right-hand touchline to score.

Sam Ulph landed a penalty, with Morgan kicking a drop goal.

"I thought first-half we held ourselves; we were in there and looked composed, we fell behind early on, but at half-time we felt we were in an even game," said Jones.

"We knew that if we kicked away loose possession, they've probably got the best three backline attack players in the league and our kicking game had to be spot-on.

"In the second-half it was a game of who has the ball and who hasn't, and today Saints controlled the ball really well in the second-half, and we were just unhappy that the last score took them to 40.

"Positives for London Welsh; we prepared well, we knew this would be a tough challenge and the boys are upbeat about the season. So we now have to take the positives out of today and build for next week."

London Welsh: S Ulph, J Strong, P Mackey, G Evans (A Cadwallader 83min), P Sampson, G Morgan (T Marks 75min), G Nicholls, I George, A Tauialo (B McNamee 56min), K Gay (C Hannon 28min + D Williams 54min), H Quigley (B Thomas 54min), M Corker, P Cox, M Lee, H Jenkins (J Mills 60min).

Attendance: 11,507