WARRIORS director of rugby John Brain admits his side are in "big trouble" after they fell seven points behind Northampton at the foot of the Premiership following a 33-19 defeat at Gloucester.

Saints pulled off one of the shock results of the season with win at Leicester and they also have a game in hand on Warriors, who left Kingsholm without even a bonus point.

"We know we are in big trouble but we have just got to get on with it,"said Brain. "This season has been the toughest of all our careers and there is no respite but I don't think anyone who supports Worces-ter would be ashamed of their team. They should be proud of their team.

"The outlook for us is pretty bleak - we have got to be clear favourites to be relegated there is no doubt about that. The most worrying thing is, if Gloucester play like that next week against Northampton, they will lose.

"There are six games left and we have got to win two more games than Northampton."

It is hard not to sympathise with Brain after his side gave a fine account of themselves against his former club. They scored an excellent try and had another effort disallowed.

"I can't remember ever losing a game where the opposition attack has not troubled us at all and we have given a bit of trouble to the opposition defence," said Brain.

"We gave them points through some ill-discipline. In the first-half, we conceded 10 penalties to their three. We caused them a lot of problems. They didn't cause us very many at all. For a supposedly sterile attacking team we didn't look too bad. I thought our set-piece, particularly in the second-half, was outstanding.

"Losing is always hard to take but losing by that margin is very hard to bear."