De Bruyne stars in Manchester City's friendly win in Houston

Two clinical Kevin De Bruyne strikes handed Manchester City a winning start to pre-season with a 2-1 victory over Club America in Houston.

In what was an occasionally tempestuous friendly on a difficult surface, Pep Guardiola gave minutes to the majority of his travelling squad – but Erling Haaland was still left waiting for a debut.

Haaland, the £51million signing, had a night off as 61,223 flocked to the NRG Stadium to see the Premier League champions. 

Here, Sportsmail picks five things we learned.

Grealish gets down and dirty 

This friendly might have been thousands of miles away from Manchester but Jack Grealish must have felt right at home. Scythed down by the opposition at every opportunity and relentlessly booed by the home crowd: this could have been any given Premier League ground.

Grealish has a big second season on the horizon and showed a real desire to make an impact, even if this was merely a first friendly of the tour. The referee, Armando Villarreal, certainly knew of his existence, with the pair often deep in conversation about penalty appeals.

He was hacked down at the end of a mazy run, where he took three Club America defenders out of the game, and constantly barracked. Grealish showed purpose, dropping into dangerous pockets, but could not escape rough treatment – some of which the broadcaster inside the NRG refused to show on the big screen.

Perhaps that will serve him well for the months to come. Guardiola will be impressed by the way in which the winger continued to persevere.

De Bruyne again City's talisman 

Kevin De Bruyne picked up from where he left off. Two goals – the first a curling effort from 20 yards, the second a more instinct run and slide underneath Guillermo Ochoa – indicated that