Manchester City boss Mark Hughes was pleased with the performances of fringe players Gelson Fernandes and Felipe Caicedo in last night's 3-1 defeat by Racing Santander in the UEFA Cup.

Juan Valera extended their lead before Felipe Caicedo scored a late consolation goal for City after stepping off the bench.

Hughes, who made wholesale changes to his side, said: "Ideally we would have preferred to have won the game but credit to Racing, they are a good team.

"Their motivation was to try and get into the next round. We had already qualified so that might have taken a little bit of edge out of our game.

"We made changes as we wanted to give the likes of Shaun Wright-Phillips, Stephen Ireland and Vincent Kompany a little bit of a rest.

"I think that was important given the number of games coming up. They are key players for us.

"In the second half we just needed to steady ourselves and we did that. We got more games into some of the players who have not had a lot of football.

"Gelson (Fernandes) got 90 minutes which is important while Caicedo has come on and made an impression. We have to take the positives out of the game.

"We have topped the group and that was the order of the day. We are grateful for that."