Michael O’Neill outlines Stoke City transfer priority ahead of summer window | OneFootball

Michael O’Neill has revealed that he wants to bring in a target man during the transfer window to help his Stoke City side.

The Potters had been expected to push for promotion this season but they failed to challenge for the play-offs after an underwhelming campaign which saw the side end up in 14th position.

Therefore, attention has been on next season for some time, with plenty of changes to the squad expected, even if O’Neill is having to work on a budget.

And, speaking to the club’s media, the former Northern Ireland chief admitted one position in particular is a priority to help the team play in a different way.

“We faced a different situation because we’ve become more of a possession-based team and sides have come and frustrated us at home. I know that can be frustrating for supporters. At times we struggled to deal with that, we struggled to break teams down.

“That comes into our thinking when we look at the players we try to recruit in this window. We might have to have a bigger striker than we’ve had, for example, to be able to go a bit more direct as well.”

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John Carew joined Stoke on loan from West Ham.

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The verdict

It’s clear that Stoke need to try and improve the team during the summer months and finding players that can score more goals has to be the priority as a return of 57 from 46 games isn’t good enough.

Of course, to do that they may need to change the style and it appears that’s something the boss wants to do.

So, it will be very interesting to see what player he does bring in ahead of what is a massive summer as Stoke really need to be pushing the top six next season.