Mark Hughes could not hide his delight after he got his Manchester City reign underway with a confident European victory on Thursday evening.First-half goals from Martin Petrov and Dietmar Hamann gave City a comfortable 2-0 win over EB Streymur in the Faroe Islands in their UEFA Cup first round first leg match.

Hughes accepted City's second-half performance wasted the chance of a comprehensive victory over the part-timers - but he will go into the second leg at Barnsley on July 31 convinced of further progress in the competition.

Hughes said: "The fitness levels were at different stages, they are halfway through their domestic season. So you are not quite sure what you are going to come up against.

"But I was pleased with the performance. Particularly in the first half when we kept possession well - we shifted it well and accurately and great purpose. Our tempo was also very good.

"We caused them problems and had plenty of chances. We scored two great goals from Martin and Didi, we are delighted with that.

"The second half was to be expected really, we were quite comfortable and they made a better fist of it.

"They tried to close us down and did that much better than in the first period. We were a little guilty of playing too much in our own half and that invited them onto us.

"But we were comfortable and still created a few more chances. It could have been a more comprehensive victory but two goals away from home in Europe and a clean sheet is a good result."

Hughes was particularly happy with the display of £19million new striker Jo, and the quality of winger Petrov.

He said: "We created good chances and I was pleased with Jo's performance.

"He showed great awareness of players around him, and once he gets to know the players and the way we want to play he will be a big asset to us.

"Petrov was excellent, certainly in the first half. The opposition found it difficult to cope with the quality he has.

"He put a lot of dangerous crosses into the box and with luck we could have converted more.

"But overall his performance was excellent, he got us off on the right foot with that opening goal and pushed us towards a good performance all round.

"We hope he will be proving a lot of goals this season. He has the ability to go past people, and break through the lines.

"When you have someone like that with the technical ability to affect the game positively like that, it gives you a lot more options."

Hughes introduced teenage striker Ched Evans in the second period - and made it clear he will not be allowing the Wales international to go out on loan.

Hughes explained: "Ched has been excellent in pre-season and I am glad we have secured him on a long-term contract now.

"He has a big future and that has been demonstrated by the amount of phone calls I have had from Championship managers wanting to get him out on loan.

"But I think I am going to frustrate a lot of teams at that level because he will not be going anywhere in this transfer window."

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