Stoke City chief Tony Scholes is delighted with the way manager Mark Hughes is working with football chief Mark Cartwright.
Scholes says Cartwright receives clear direction from Hughes as he taps into contacts across Europe in the search for a bargain such as Marko Arnautovic.
He told The Sentinel: "Mark Hughes is a very clear thinker. He knows where he would like to strengthen and the kind of player he needs to do that so Mark (Cartwright) and his team are given a definite steer on what kind of players we should be looking for.
"We have to look at the European market because at this level you have to look at the available talent pool.
"I don't know what we would have had to pay for Arnautovic if he had been playing in England, but it's fair to say you can get better value in parts of Europe than for English players."
