EXETER City manager Paul Tisdale couldn't hide his delight with his side's performance despite the 2-0 defeat to Crystal Palace at Ladysmead last night.

The Grecians dominated their Championship opponents for large parts of the encounter and created plenty of excellent goalscoring opportunities.

In the end City failed to find the net and the Eagles punished them in the second half, when Darren Ambrose struck twice — once from the spot — to seal a win for George Burley's side.

But Tisdale was unperturbed. He said: "It was excellent, it was a really good game and we played extremely well. We defended really well and created loads of chances.

"The ball didn't quite drop for us, but on the whole our forward play was really sharp.

"There were some things I was delighted with. The way we moved as a group and the areas we covered — we created some really good chances.

"Our ball play was excellent. (Daniel) Nardiello went close a couple of times and on the whole I was really pleased, apart from the five minutes we had after we made a second set of changes."

Basking in the Mid Devon sunshine and taking in the glorious views of the surrounding countryside offered by Tiverton Town's home, one could be forgiven for thinking fans were watching a cricket match.

Among the crowd, short sleeves and sunglasses were the order of the day, while each piece of good play was greeted with the kind of polite applause more commonly associated with Exeter's County Ground or Exmouth's Maer.

But some of the action on the pitch would certainly have been better associated with a freezing cold Tuesday night in mid-December, so quickly did the Grecians get into their stride.

The pre-season friendly, and particularly the first half, served as an exciting glimpse of the year ahead for City fans.

Ryan Harley strolled around the park looking as composed as ever and Liam Sercombe was superb alongside him, while Richard Duffy took no prisoners at the back and Daniel Nardiello caused Claude Davis no end of problems.

Palace — perhaps hindered by the number of triallists among their ranks and transfer speculation hanging over their permanent players — toiled in the late afternoon sun.

There were negative points for City — captain Matt Taylor was forced off with a jarred back after only half an hour, while Duffy took a knock on his knee soon after.

And there was also no first-half goal for the large crowd to cheer, despite some promising play from the temporary hosts.

Logan went close early on, albeit with a scuffed effort, while Duffy and David Noble both fired over after Grecians corners were only half-cleared. Nardiello looked most likely to notch. Buoyed by his pre-season form so far, he stretched to fire one excellent cross from Sercombe wide from a tight angle.

The former Blackpool man then fired across the face of goal, having again been set up by Sercombe, and made it a hat-trick of missed chances when he fired wide after pouncing on Scott Golbourne's knock down.

Nardiello finally hit the target when he cut inside and forced Speroni into a reaction save, before Logan nodded over when Steve Tully pumped the ball back into the box.

But, as the half wore on, the Eagles began to wrestle control back from City and, when Burley introduced a couple of fresh faces, the visitors really forced the issue.

Substitute Sean Scannell had barely touched the ball before he got a chance to run at Scot Bennett in the 68th minute.

The winger forced his marker back into the penalty area. Rob Edwards came across to help, but could only bring the Palace wideman down. Ambrose coolly converted the spot-kick.

And two minutes later the Eagles' most valuable commodity made it 2-0, pouncing on a mistake from Bennett, who let a bouncing ball under his foot, before side-footing past City keeper Artur Krysiak.

Despite conceding, City stuck to their guns and continued to look like they were enjoying themselves. Dunne set up new signing John O'Flynn for a header which missed the target, while Jake Thomson also tried his luck at the back post, shooting narrowly wide.

Exeter City: Krysiak, Duffy (Edwards, 46), Taylor (Bennett, 30), Jones (Shephard, 74), Tully (Dunne, 65), Noble (Heath, 74), Golbourne (Cozic, 65), Sercombe (Thomson, 65), Harley (Frear, 65), Logan (Cureton, 74), Nardiello (O'Flynn, 74)

Crystal Palace: Speroni, Holland, McCarthy, Davis (N'Diaye), Branco (Taianan, 46), Danns, Dorman (Lee, 55), Ambrose (Ani, 80), 11 Zaha (Cadogan, 55), Triallist, Andrew (Scannell, 66 (Djilali, 80))

Attendance: 1,107

Match stats (Exeter first): Shots on target — 2-4; Shots off target — 13-3; Free-kicks conceded — 2-7; Corners — 5-3; Offsides — 8-1