Substitute Yang Xu headed home in stoppage time to hand China a hard-fought victory over Latvia in an friendly at Kunming Tuodong Stadium today.

The visitors proved more dangerous throughout the match with Jurijs Zigajevs smashing a penalty against the crossbar eight minutes into the second period.

But Yang connected with Wang Song's free-kick to head home the only goal in the closing minutes as China emerged triumphant in a warm-up match for the 2011 Asian Cup finals in Qatar.

"Chinese football is still struggling to achieve something in continental tournaments, and we must double efforts to improve ourselves," said China coach Gao Hongbo.

Latvia coach Aleksandrs Starkovs felt his side were good enough to have claimed at least a draw.

"My young players received a good training course in today's game," he said. "The result didn't necessarily reflect my side's good performance. We were just not lucky enough to score a goal."