Despite losing through an early goal from Silva, the Blues came back to hit the bar twice before the break, and Geovanni went close with a spectacular effort near the end.
Sven said: “We saw two players who I have only seen in two practice sessions before now, which was good, but I knew already that Elano was a great player and Garrido is a very good left back.
“The other thing for me was that we matched Valencia, one of the best teams in Europe today. I thought we played as well as they did and created more chances than them.
“We had five new players out there, two of them have not played for us at all in pre-season and don’t speak English, so if you take all of that into consideration then today was good.”
The manager was introduced to the crowd just before kick off, and was touched by the ovation he received, saying:
“It was fantastic, I’m very happy and I want to say a big thank you to all the fans that came up today. It was a nice welcome and gave me a good feeling.
“Everyone that came today can see that we have brought good players to the club. They are young, hungry, want to play in the Premier League and they will be good for the club.”
