Mark Hughes today remained confident that Manchester City's failure to make the most of their dominance against Aalborg will not cost them a place in the UEFA Cup quarter-finals, writes David Smith.

City will take a two-goal advantage to Denmark next week, thanks to first-half strikes at Eastlands last night from Felipe Caicedo and Shaun Wright-Phillips. But it could have been many more.

Hughes said: "Ideally we would like to have put the game to bed. We had enough chances to score more than we did.

"But we got a positive result and a clean sheet and overall it was a very good European performance."

City are now on the brink of their first appearance in a European quarter-final for 30 years.

Hughes insisted: "We are in good shape. Once you get through to the quarters and semi-finals then you can start thinking about winning the whole thing."