Tony Pulis still feels the need to beef up his Stoke squad after they reinforced their Championship promotion bid with a 2-1 win over Cardiff.Deadline-day recruits Glenn Whelan, a £500,000 signing from Sheffield Wednesday, and Paul Gallagher, on loan from Blackburn, were only on the bench.

And Stoke's run of just one defeat in 14 games has now put them within striking distance of the top two.

An own goal from Roger Johnson and a Ricardo Fuller penalty were enough to earn the Potters victory, with Jimmy-Floyd Hasselbaink replying for the Welsh side.

Pulis said: "I would still like to bring in more quality. When you look at Cardiff's bench it was very strong and we need to match that sort of strength in depth.

"When the loan window opens we will be trying hard to add to the group, but of course the players here are doing a great job and I was delighted to add Glenn and Paul to that."

Pulis felt his side deserved to edge Saturday's early clash, which came to life in an enthralling second half.

He added: "We had enough chances to be comfortable, but we missed too many and made life difficult for ourselves.

"Cardiff kept going and the goal put them right back in it. They are a good side and I'm sure they will recover from this. I regard them as one of our chief rivals for promotion."

Chances were few and far between in the tight early exchanges, but the hosts were ahead at the break thanks to Johnson's own goal.

Paul Parry should have cleared Liam Lawrence's right-wing corner, but he missed his kick and the ball bounced in off the shins of Johnson.

Stoke looked to be coasting when Fuller rolled in their second from a 57th-minute penalty after he was flattened by Kevin McNaughton.

Cardiff halved the deficit when Parry placed Peter Whittingham's free-kick back across goal and Hasselbaink prodded his shot into an empty net at the far post.

Cardiff boss Dave Jones said: "We are a bit wounded and upset to see our run end, but I didn't think we played as well as we have done.

"It was our poorest performance in the last four or five games and for some reason our tempo was not as high as usual.

"We were unfortunate with the own goal and kept the ball well at times, but we didn't really do enough with it.

"The second goal was also poor from our point of view. It came from a break after our corner and we should be more clever than that.

"Stoke are a big side and this is a difficult place to come. What we have to do is take this on the chin and bounce back."

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