Despite showing glimpses of some bright attacking potential during the friendly contest, McCall's side were defeated 4-1 by Burnley due in part to some clinical finishing from their top-flight visitors.
The City chief was quick to acknowledge the quality of the Bantams' opponents at the Northern Commercials Stadium but he still felt his side could take a number of positives from the defeat.
McCall said: "The first fifteen minutes I was really pleased with.
"The lads set off with real confidence, playing some good football and creating a couple of chances, but then we got hit with three goals in six minutes.
"That obviously knocked our momentum and it would have been easy to have gone flat afterwards but we kept going and got one back.
"There isn't too much you can do at times when you are up against that quality - the first two goals at least were good goals from their point of view.
"The third goal is disappointing from us though, it is a bread and butter ball that we should be dealing with better.
"We bounced back from that triple confidence blow and got a goal I felt our first half performance certainly deserved.
"The second half seemed fairly equal. They brought on a number of subs after the break, fresh legs, making it another challenge for us.
"The last goal for them is a bit sloppy for us but overall, considering the quality we were up against, I can be happy with some of the individual performances."
With new signing Romain Vincelot watching on from the stands, City were once again without James Hanson and James Meredith as McCall and his coaching staff continued to err on the side of caution due to minor injuries for the duo.
McCall continued: "We wanted a number of players to get some minutes under their belt, plus the injuries we have, it meant we had to play with a certain shape today (Saturday).
"We had to play (Filipe) Morais in that number ten role and then Billy Clarke up top even though he is really normally a number ten himself.
"We also had three of last season's back four missing, plus big Hans (James Hanson), Romain (Vincelot) and perhaps a couple others to come in, so there is options to come back.
"Today was a good exercise for us and we'll have learned some valuable lessons."