Ronnie Moore accused Phil Parkinson of “getting carried away” after City’s unbeaten home start came a cropper against lowly Tranmere.

Ryan Lowe’s second-half strike yesterday condemned the Bantams to only their second loss since winning promotion.

Parkinson was unhappy with referee Darren Drysdale’s handling of an ugly match. He felt the official should have clamped down on Tranmere’s delaying tactics and sent off skipper Ian Goodison for knocking over Kyel Reid with a forearm.

Parkinson squared up angrily with the Jamaican defender after the incident – and had more words with opposite number Moore at the final whistle.

The Tranmere chief, who always gets stick at Valley Parade, said: “It was stupid what happened with me and Phil. I’d been taking dog’s abuse from the crowd all afternoon so I turned round and applauded them at the end.

“Phil said to me ‘well done on the win but don’t take the mickey out of the crowd’. I was upset by that because who is he to tell me what to do?

“It looks to me as though he’s getting carried away with promotion and Wembley last season.”

Parkinson was convinced that Goodison, making his 400th appearance for Tranmere, should have been dismissed for flattening Reid just before half-time.

He said: “As soon as it happened, I was absolutely certain it was a red. When you do that, 99 times out of 100 it would be.

“The fourth official said he hit him with his forearm not elbow. But if you forearm-smash somebody, in my book that’s still a red card.

“Tranmere came to spoil the game. You can’t blame them because they are scrapping for their lives at the bottom.

“They will feel it was a very professional performance but I don’t think the officials did enough to negate their tactics of slowing the game down.

“From the first whistle, it was clear what Tranmere intended to do. It’s the officials’ job to make sure the paying customer sees a game of football which has got some kind of flow to it – 14,000 people will be thinking the same as me.”

Moore saw the Goodison incident very differently and claimed that the centre half was only booked for getting involved with Parkinson.

He argued: “They were clearly trying to get him sent off. Their manager got involved when he shouldn’t have done.

“Ian wasn’t booked for the challenge. The referee booked him for pushing Phil Parkinson.

“But he got that one wrong as well because it was Parkinson who shoved him and my player is upset about the yellow card.”

It was the first time City have failed to score in League One, while Tranmere claimed only their second win. Parkinson felt the back four should not have been caught out by the long ball leading to Lowe’s clincher.

“It’s a basic thing which we didn’t deal with and let a very good goal-scorer get free in our penalty box,” he said.

“It was a bitty first half and we couldn’t find that moment of quality. But I thought the lads were great in the second and did everything we could to get something out of the game.”