The left-back got the full 90 minutes under his belt as the Ton completed their pre-season preparations with a friendly against Steve Evans’ side.

He admitted it was a tough game to play in, particularly trying to compete physically, but believes it will prove a rewarding run-out ahead of the return to competitive action this weekend.

The 19-year-old told the Tele: “It was a good, hard game for us against a big, physical team and we just have to learn from that and take it into the upcoming season.

“What did I take away from it? That we have to move the ball sharply, pass the ball a bit faster. The play is a bit faster because they are used to it in the Championship in England.

“Will we come up against a similar standard in the [Scottish] “Championship? Possibly.

“It’s obviously a league up for us after winning promotion, so it’ll be bigger, better players.

“We’ll come up against harder opposition who will be harder to play against, so I think this friendly was definitely good preparation for that.

“There’s no point going and playing against lesser quality teams in all of your pre-season games with that step up to come, and we’ll definitely have learned a lot from this game.” At the beginning of the last week, Ton faced a Celtic side including Anthony Stokes and Stefan Scepovic in long-serving kitman Andy Bryan’s testimonial.

Russell says that was another important building block in their pre-season preparations, and explained that although it was as equally challenging as facing Rotherham, it also asked different questions “Championship? Possibly.

“It’s obviously a league up for us after winning promotion, so it’ll be bigger, better players.

“We’ll come up against harder opposition who will be harder to play against, so I think this friendly was definitely good preparation for that.

“There’s no point going and playing against lesser quality teams in all of your pre-season games with that step up to come, and we’ll definitely have learned a lot from this game.” At the beginning of the last week, Ton faced a Celtic side including Anthony Stokes and Stefan Scepovic in long-serving kitman Andy Bryan’s testimonial.

Russell says that was another important building block in their pre-season preparations, and explained that although it was as equally challenging as facing Rotherham, it also asked different questions