Ben Cohen and Carlos Spencer will ponder their futures

Saints ended their season with a 27-22 win over London Irish but Worcester's victory condemned them to the drop.

Grayson said: "It's been too late since mid-February. We've struggled to win games and there were losses at home to Quins and Worcester.

"But ultimately you get what you deserve and we deserved what we got."

Relegation will cost Saints around �2m and Grayson admitted jobs will be lost in order to balance the books.

I'd be happy to work underneath someone else Paul Grayson

"What hurts me most is some people will lose their jobs and that's hard to take. But the world keeps turning.

"When you have to plan out a season and take account of relegation then you've already gone through part of the grieving process.

"We should never have been in this position in the first place. The players haven't produced and we take responsibility for that collectively.

606: DEBATE Let's hope Saints can bounce back as effectively as they did last time they were relegated to NL1 AJ

"As someone sitting at the top of pile I also have to take it on the chin.

"The players are desperately hurt in the changing room and if they could start next season now they would.

"Injuries, poor form and some documented stuff behind the scenes put us in the position where relegation was a possibility."

Some of that "documented stuff" centred on a possible split between the Kiwi contingent and the English players in the squad.

We are keeping the nucleus of this team, we are not going anywhere Scrum-half Mark Robinson

But former All Blacks scrum-half Mark Robinson insisted stories of splits in the camp were "blown out of all proportion".

"It wasn't accurate, it wasn't true," he said. "Everyone works hard here as a team, and in the professional game you are going to have a mix of nationalities in every squad.

"This hurts a lot, I can tell you. It's incredibly disappointing. We put everything into the game and did what we could. I thought if we won, Saracens would beat Worcester and we woud be OK."

Star players such as Carlos Spencer and Ben Cohen have indicated they would be forced to assess their futures in the event of relegation.

But Robinson insisted it will not mean the break-up of the Saints squad.

"We are keeping the nucleus of this team, we are not going anywhere," he added.

"We have got to work on the things that weren't right this season, rebuild and focus on getting back in the Premiership."

Grayson, for his part, said he would be happy to continue if asked in a reorganised coaching structure.

"Until someone tells me otherwise I'll be here,' he added. "I'd be happy to work underneath someone else.

"I haven't got an ego, I just want to be good at my job. I'm an inexperienced coach and I've made mistakes this year but there are some things the club needs to get right to make sure this doesn't happen again."