Peterborough United boss Darren Ferguson was pleased with his side's performance in the pre-season friendly against Manchester United at London Road and insists it was the perfect warm-up for the opening Coca-Cola League One fixture of the campaign at Southend United on Saturday.

Posh were beaten 2-0 by a strong United side in front of over 13,000 supporters on Monday evening and although the pace of the game slowed in the second half, it was still an entertaining encounter.

'I thought we did well in the first half and created quite a few chances, but we couldn't make the breakthrough and then we gave a sloppy goal away. It was just one of those things, Russell was trying to chest the ball back to Joe and just got more on it than he wanted. Joe said he should have done better, but we can't dwell on that.

'The second goal United scored was a fantastic strike and there is not a lot we can do about goals like that. The second half slowed a bit in terms of the pace, but that was to be expected. I wanted to give the majority of my players the chance to play and they all did well.

'It was the perfect game for us ahead of the new league season and the most important factor for me is that we go to Southend with a pretty fit squad and that is crucial. I have a big decision to make in terms of selection, but that is a good headache to have,' Ferguson told theposh.com.