Valencia striker David Villa was both the villain and then the hero for Spain as Vicente Del Bosque's side started their World Cup qualifying campaign with a 1-0 win over Bosnia-Herzegovina in Murcia.

Villa missed a first half penalty, but then scored the only goal of the game to ensure there was no upset as the Spanish fulfilled expectations by starting with a win.

With Fernando Torres and David Silva both out injured, Del Bosque opted not to give a debut to Barcelona youngster Bojan Krkic. Instead he opted to bring in winger David Capel to give the Spain side width and pace and Cesc Fabrigas to play alongside Marcos Senna and Xavi Hernandez in central midfield.

That left Villa to play as a lone striker with Andres Iniesta given a free role just behind him.

Spain started brightly and Capel showed his pace early on, drawing a foul from Damjanovic, for which the Bosnian was booked inthe fourth minute.

Nevertheless the Spanish struggled to create chances early on, their first effort being a long range effort from defender Raul Albiol. Villa meanwhile kept falling into the Bosnian offside trap, while Capel was Spain's most lively player.

Berberovic was proving to be the main threat for Bosnia, although he was trying to take on the Spanish virtually on his own in attack.

Marcos Senna rattled the Bosnian crossbar after 27 minutes with a long rage effort, barely two minutes after Xavi had headed into the hands of Haasagic as Spain looked to make their class tell.

Villa had the perfect chance to open the scoring 10 minutes fromtime from the penalty spot, after a foul on Capel.

However, the Spain striker uncharacteristically put his right foot effort wide and both sides reached the halftime break with no change to the score.

It took just 12 minutes of the second half for Villa to redeem himself. Cesc's through ball allowed the Spain forward to round the keeper and slide the ball home from a tight angle to put his side ahead.

Iniesta tried to increase the lead with 20 minutes remaining, but fired over from the edge of the area, while Capdevila and Villa got in each others' way following a Haasagic's poor block from another Senna effort.

Bosnia-Herzegovina never looked like getting back on level terms, but despite controlling the game totally, Spain were unable to add a second.

Source: Xinhua