A well-taken goal by Georgios Samaras in the 35th minute gave Manchester City a 1-0 win over Chinese Super League side Shanghai Shenhua, but the victory was marred by Ben Thatcher's sending-off 13 minutes from the end of a lacklustre second-half performance.

Samaras capitalised on approach play of the highest quality from new Italian signing Bernardo Corradi, whose strength and vision set up the Greece international to open the scoring.

But a poor display in the second half, which saw Shanghai dominate and Thatcher sent off, will have done little to please manager Stuart Pearce with the clock ticking down to the start of the new Barclays Premiership season.

One highlight for the Eastlands club was the first-half performance of Corradi, who led the line for a City side lacking the defensive strength Pearce had hoped would be available in the build-up to the game.

David James - a reported transfer target for Portsmouth - was left out in favour of Nicky Weaver while defensive duo Sylvain Distin and Micah Richards were both ruled out with minor injuries.

As a result, City started with a central defensive pairing of Richard Dunne and Steve Jordan while Thatcher slotted in at left-back.

Pearce had more joy in midfield as Joey Barton and Dietmar Hamann linked up and Corradi was joined up front by Darius Vassell.

But on a bumpy pitch that had more in common with a potato patch than a playing surface, City started the game in disjointed fashion and the first opportunity of the game fell to Shenhua.

With barely four minutes on the clock, Shanghai's Honduran international striker Luis Ramirez was upended by Jordan 20 yards from goal but captain Xiao Zhanbo put his free-kick into City's defensive wall.

Four minutes later Corradi almost claimed his first goal for his new club when Trevor Sinclair sent in an inviting cross from the right only for the Italian to glance his effort wide of Zhao Yajun's goal.

Corradi had more success in the 21st minute when once again Sinclair found space down the right channel to send in his cross. The ball was met by the former Valencia striker, but this time his header was clawed away for a corner by Zhao.

Despite looking the most likely City player to score, it was Corradi who provided the spark through which the Premier League side took the lead 10 minutes from half-time.

After holding the ball up on the corner of the penalty area, Corradi turned before playing an exquisite ball across the face of goal, where Samaras emerged to score from the tightest of angles.

Having struggled for large portions of the first half, Shanghai looked the more composed of the two teams in the second period, with former German international Carsten Jancker causing problems to the City defence with his physical approach.

The replacement, too, of Samaras with Ishmael Miller on the left side appeared to upset City's rhythm and, as a result, left-back Thatcher looked increasingly exposed.

It was from the Shanghai right that the danger came through winger Sun Ji and, 16 minutes after the restart, Dunne was called upon to deny Ramirez after Sun's cross had found the Honduran in a promising position.

Three minutes later it was Jordan who was called on to take evasive action as Sun again caused problems with his crossing.

City continued to struggle as Jancker caused more and more problems but the former Bayern Munich and Udinese man was to end the evening frustrated after seeing Jordan hook his leg around the German's hulking frame to clear in the 73rd minute.

Sinclair came close to doubling City's lead against the run of play when he broke through the middle, only for his shot to clip the outside of Zhao's post with the goalkeeper beaten.

Thatcher then received his marching orders after an altercation with Sun, referee Wang Xueqing showing the-left back his second yellow card of the game following the confrontation between the two in front of the Shenhua dugout.

And Jancker proved it was not to be his night nine minutes from time when he was unable to steer Sun's pass into the empty goal with Weaver stranded.