TONY PULIS is happy to lower his sights in the transfer market in January, but insists he is not prepared to bring players to Middlesbrough just to make up the numbers.

The Boro boss is actively working on potential arrivals early in the new year, knowing his squad is short in certain areas – particularly out wide and in a creative sense.

Aston Villa’s Albert Adomah and QPR’S Luke Freeman are two of those to be consistently linked having been on Pulis’ radar before.

But Pulis, whose side are looking to climb back into the Championship’s top two by defeating Villa on Saturday evening, does not want to rush into anything that will not suit the club.

“It’s all according to what’s around,” said Pulis. “I didn’t do it in the summer or the previous window, I won’t sign players for the sake of signing them. We have to try to get the right players in.

“We might not be able to get the top ones we want but the ones underneath might be worth the risk. I won’t go under that. I don’t think it’s worth the risk to do that. That is not a policy that will ever work.”

He added: “We know what we want, we know what we’re trying to get. Whether we can do it is another thing. I want the supporters to realise that this football club understands what we need.

“What we’re not going to do is go out there and waste the chairman’s money, I don’t think that’s right. But we are in the market and actively looking for players who’ll improve the team.

“And that’s what we want, we don’t just want players to fill it up, we want players who’ll come in and get into the team.”

Pulis is approaching his first year anniversary in charge at the Riverside, and he has gone about changing quite a lot at Rockliffe Park since his first game defeat to Aston Villa. He has tried to be careful on his spending under chairman Steve Gibson.

“He has known that (players were needed in certain areas since the window closed in August),” said Pulis. “We had targets and couldn’t get them, it wasn’t as if we weren’t trying to bring players in, we were trying.

“The club had spent over £50m on seven or eight players, the thing big in my mind was rectifying that spend and bringing it back to a level where this club could run with.”

Middlesbrough will be without Rudy Gestede against Villa. Lewis Wing and Ryan Shotton will be assessed and could make the bench.