COACH Chris Anderson measured his Newport-Gwent Dragons against Zurich Premiership heavyweights Northampton Saints and saw his side suffer their second pre-season defeat after the loss to a scratch Welsh Premier League outfit 10 days ago.

And despite Saturday's five tries to one defeat at Franklin's Gardens, the former Aussie rugby league coach said: "It was good for me to see what a top English side is and I didn't think we were that far away."

Anderson had been handicapped by WRU rules that prevented him playing influential playmaker Ceri Sweeney for the full 80 minutes, and he used most of the 25 players he took up to the Midlands in the weekend friendly.

But for this Saturday's friendly against Ulster, the side coached last season by Saints' new boss Alan Solomons, he will be fielding something approaching the side that will kick-off the Dragons' Celtic League challenge a fortnight later.

"We won't be making as many changes against Ulster and we will try and keep our main players on the field for longer and we will be narrowing our choice for the first game against Cardiff so we have players with a full game under their belt."

For much of the first half the Dragons dominated play with the forwards led by flanker Jason Forster taking the game to Saints.

From the opening whistle they went through a dozen phases of patient, controlled rugby but all they had to show was a 35m penalty from Sweeny in the 12th minute.

Half-backs Gareth Baber and Sweeney controlled proceedings, but Dragons were unable to penetrate the Midlanders' superbly organised blanket defence.

But when England winger Ben Cohen charged down centre Jon Bryant's attempted clearance Saints reacted brilliantly for former Biarritz centre Marc Stcherbina to finish off with a 35th minute try.

And three minutes later the Dragons were trailing 14-3 when Cohen went in for a try. A second penalty from Sweeney in injury time cut the deficit back to eight points.

But another rapid two try burst from winger John Rudd and former All Black Bruce Reihana in the 51st and 53rd minutes left the Dragons for dead.

But Saints managed only one more try from giant winger Rudd after 63 minutes, and Dragons had the final say with a well-worked 79th minute score from full-back Kevin Morgan.

The major let down for Dragons was that they didn't make the most of what they worked for in the first-half. "With the pressure we put on we should have come away with a try or two," Anderson said. "The opportunities were there but we took the wrong options.

He added: "I thought we matched them pretty well in the first half but there was five minutes when we lost a bit of control and they scored two tries. We were disappointed with that, but apart from that I was really pleased with our intensity and our strength in the game."