Phil Parkinson praised Simon Ramsden’s first outing of the season but warned him: It’s only the start.

Ramsden played an hour in yesterday’s private friendly at Tranmere – the right back’s first game since the pre-season clash with Bolton in July.

Ross Hannah scored on his return to action as City won 1-0 at Prenton Park but the chief focus was on Ramsden.

Parkinson was delighted to see him emerge unscathed but also preached caution.

“Simon looked fine and he did some great delivery into the front players. He got 60 minutes under his belt and did well.

“But we’re not going to get carried away. He knows it’s only the start of a long road.”

The next reserve game against Middlesbrough is not for a fortnight and City may try to squeeze another behind-closed-doors outing into next week to aid the defender’s recovery.

Parkinson added: “We’ve been building Simon up the right way so he was ready for the game. He’s done two weeks of full training and worked hard while we were away down at Swindon, doing high-intensity three v threes, two v twos and one against one stuff.”

Chris Mitchell, Steve Williams and Jack Compton also featured yesterday and Nahki Wells impressed after coming on at half-time. Tranmere fielded a strong team, including former Leeds winger Andy Robinson, and Parkinson said: “It was a good work-out for the boys played at a decent pace. It was worth doing.”