MANAGER Steve Watson says there are plenty of positives to take from York City’s 5-0 home defeat on Wednesday evening to Leeds United.

With it being the first outing of pre-season, Watson was eager to get minutes into his players – and that he did, with only Reiss Harrison and Kiari Ventura remaining on the bench throughout.

Added to that, the squad, by and large, made it through unscathed, though triallist Billy Beresford was not risked for the second half after coming off feeling his hamstring.

Watson was also pleased with Beresford’s fellow triallist, centre-half Josh King, as well as with his first sighting of Tom Allan in City colours.

The other bonus was the 5,180 fans in attendance.

The only downside was the quality of opposition City faced, with Leeds taking a 4-0 break into half-time thanks to Manchester City loanee Jack Harrison’s brace and strikes from Kemar Roofe and Pablo Hernandez.

Adam Forshaw’s strike early in the second half ensured the remainder would be a formality, with Leeds’ side from the first hour asserting greater dominance on the game and leaving City chasing shadows at times.

“I wouldn’t say the scoreline is irrelevant,” Watson said. “Some of the goals were very clinical. Some of the goals were little errors and we would concede them goals at any level.

“It’s still early in the season and we would hope to eradicate them as we go along.

“It was a heck of a workout for us,” he said, joking: “We won’t face anything like that this season unless we get to the quarter-finals, semi-finals of the FA Cup.

“That’s virtually a Premier League side. They’re a top, top Championship-stroke-Premiership side, almost.

“We were always going to struggle and they were always going to have great energy levels and be technically amazing.

“We got as much as we could out of the game. We didn’t score, which was disappointing, we made a couple of bad decisions in the final third where they didn’t but, as I say, you’ve got to take the positives out of it.

“The main positive, apart from the football side of it, is you’re talking about 5,000 people getting through the gates, which makes a big difference to the club as well.”