Crystal Palace boss Roy Hodgson has cooled talk of a move for free agent Samir Nasri.

The 30-year-old Frenchman left Turkish side Antalyaspor at the end of January and has been linked with a return to England.

"It's not just a question of whether you like a player or whether you respect a player," Hodgson told the Croydon Advertiser.

"It's a question of if you bring that player in, is he in a position where you really need him and by bringing him in, are you bringing him in to play or are just to sit on the bench, and will he satisfied by that?

"So we have to look into all of those things. But at the moment, if we are going to bring free agents in, it would be more useful for when I look at the balance of our squad, if they were a forward or a goalkeeper, because there we are desperately short of numbers.

"In midfield we are not short of numbers."