Vålerenga debutant Troy Perkins pitched a shutout to help the Eliteserien opening day hosts edge Adin Brown's Aalesund FK on Saturday.

New Tangoshirt Pat Noonan watched the entire proceedings from the AaFK bench.

Perkins didn't have a great deal of work to do to post his first Norwegian shutout , but needed to come out and disrupt a Kjetil Wæhler area invasion in the sixth minute. The keeper suffered a cut near his temple, but carried on after collecting himself.

Brown, meanwhile, was having a busy day. The Bear was forced to deny Bengt Sæterenes and Daniel Fredheim Holm in the early going, then made a big stop on Lars Iver Strand in the 17th minute and another on Sæterenes three minutes later.

AaFK began to level the pitch and made it to the break still on even footing. The visitors came out of the clubhouse with more initiative and Perkins was made to turn away a Jonathan Parr long range try and watched Ghana striker Razak Pimpong fire just over from a good position.

Vålerenga finally got the goal with 17 minutes to play. Dos Santos supplied the serve and Morten Berre the finishing touch as the hosts found their winner.

Perkins capped his Bohemians bow with a game saver on sub Lasse Olsen, who'd managed to break in alone.

Vålerenga will now prepare for a Sunday trip to Tromsø.

Scoring
VIF - Morten Berre 1 (Freddy dos Santos) 73'

Line-ups
VIF - Troy Perkins; Freddy dos Santos, Dan Thomassen, Kjetil Wæhler (Ronny Johnsen 46'), Allan Jepsen, Lars Iver Strand (Bojan Zajic 65'), Martin Andresen, Kristofer Hæstad, Daniel Fredheim Holm, Bengt Sæterenes, Morten Berre

AAFK - Adin Brown; Enar Jääger, Benjamin Kibebe, Haraldur Fryr Gudmundsson, Erlend Holm, Alexander Mathisen, Karl Oskar Fjørtoft, Amund Skiri (Peter Orry Larsen 83'), Jonathan Parr (Øyvind Gram 69'), Diego Silva (Lasse Olsen 69'), Razak Pimpong

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ON THE SIDELINE
Brian Waltrip watched from the bench as Molde FK opened with a nil-nil at home to Stabæk.

Brian West did not dress as Fredrikstad began the season with a 4-2 loss at defending champs Brann.