Former Reading boss Steve Coppell has urged Tony Pulis to spend big at Stoke City this summer.

Coppell said: "I once asked Sam Allardyce how to solve the second season problem, and he just said, 'Spend, spend, spend'.

"I hate to say it but he's right. That is the most simplistic way of guaranteeing success and longevity in the Premier League.

"I think hunger, or lack of it, is a factor. If a team has been successful and got promotion there is a certain freshness about them which certainly in the short term, as Hull have found, makes them rise to the occasion.

"But then you get rumbled. People know the effective parts of your team, and it is only a matter of time - unless you change the characteristics of your team - before you will find life very difficult."