Stoke chief executive Tony Scholes will continue to look into the European market for players despite the failure of some foreign players to succeed at the club.

The news comes as club record signing Giannelli Imbula finds himself on the verge of a move away from the Potters.

"I don't think there's a philosophical shift at all, but we look for the right players in the right position at any point in time," Scholes told The Sentinel.

"And you want to ensure you retain balance in your squad. So if you think your balance has shifted too much in one direction or the other, when you get the opportunity you try to shift that balance back to what we believe as a club to be the right balance.

"So in simple terms, if we feel we've got too many continental players, when we're recruiting players in the next window we will try to address that with bringing in more British players... and vice-versa.

"But that's over simplifying things because at the end of the day you don't always get to choose exactly who it is you recruit."