Taking a closer look at five Premier League clubs (Arsenal, Manchester City, Manchester United, Southampton and Spurs), we delve into what needs they have for the upcoming season.

1) Arsenal: A striker

Towards the end of last season, when he was asked about his future at Arsenal, Mesut Özil said that he had unfinished “goals” at the club. With the lackluster Olivier Giroud and injury prone Danny Welbeck as Arsenal’s main strikers, the situation is real. There are basically two options – either Arsene Wenger has never fully been convinced by Giroud, or he is no longer fully convinced by Giroud – as is proved by his comments during the European Championship about the difficulty of playing with slow strikers.

Even if the answer in fact lies somewhere in between those two options, the conclusion remains the same. If Arsenal are going to harbor title hopes and atone for the missed opportunities of last season (something cliched for Arsenal fans), Wenger needs a better center forward. The only problem is, the last time the Arsenal fans called for signing a world class striker, Wenger responded by signing a certain French teenager named Yaya Sanogo.

2) Tottenham: A quality, back-up striker

Having one of the League’s top-scorers in your team hardly means that you don’t need anyone else. Of the top 20 players with the most minutes in the Premier League last season, only two were strikers. Troy Deeney played 3,293 minutes, and Harry Kane played 3,370. The difference between the two is that Kane played another 658 minutes in other competitions, almost 700 minutes for his country and then went off to the European Championships (not to mention taking up set-piece duties). The incredulous lack of rest might actually explain Kane’s recent below-par performances.

The other options for Spurs include Heung Min Son, who is not a classic central forward, Clinton N’Jie, who will require time to settle after a serious knee injury, and Vincent Janssen who was signed from AZ Alkmaar. While Janssen shows promise, the Dutch Eredivisie league isn’t the strongest, so even if he scored 27 goals for AZ, that doesn’t mean anything in the Premier League.

3) Manchester City: Full-backs

One of the key changes Pep Guardiola will notice as he settles in as the Manchester City boss is that he now has Aleksandar Kolarov in place of Alaba, and Sagna in place of Lahm.

There is an awful lot of work for Guardiola to get this Manchester City squad ready to be successful home and abroad rather than either/or. The signing of Ilkay Gundogan helps to solve the central midfield problem (although it adds to their ever-increasing list of extremely injury prone players), and the suspicion is that Leroy Sane will be the long-term replacement for Jesus “sprint, dribble, bad cross” Navas. However, it’s at the full-back position that City look most desperate. Pablo Zabaleta’s form has dropped off a cliff in the last 18 months, while neither Kolarov or Gael Clichy have ever screamed elite class. Plus Bacary Sagna is 33.

Having brought through David Alaba and Juan Bernat at Bayern, one just can’t quite see Pep sticking with his current options.

4) Manchester United: A “good” central defender?

One of the best examples for the phrase “Nothing is permanent” is showing two Manchester United backlines over the years – one with Vidic, Ferdinand and Neville, and the other, the current defense, comprising Daley Blind, Antonio Valencia and Phil Jones. Which is why it didn’t seem an odd thing to write when Manchester United have already paid their fifth highest ever transfer fee for a central defender in this window. But Eric Bailly is surely one for the future, and none of Daley Blind, Marcos Rojo or Phil Jones are reliable starters in that position for a myriad of reasons.

Hence a central defender to afford Bailly time to settle, and Chris Smalling some much-needed support/competition, would be greatly welcome. It might even allow Blind to play in his favored defensive midfielder role, where he had started brightly in the beginning of the season.

5) Southampton: All of the above?

Southampton seem to have taken over Arsenal as the Premier League’s favorite shopping destination, having made a legacy of selling their most important individuals in the recent years. Not only that, they even lost the one man who took them to an unprecedented 6th position when many had bet on them to be relegated. Even with the outstanding Victor Wanyama and their league top scorer Sadio Mane gone, the Saints will probably feel the loss of their manager the most.

Like Wanyama, Fonte and van Dijk were outstanding last season, but it remains to be seen if they, too, join the well-treaded path outward from St.Mary’s. Claude Puel, their new manager, will have to rebuild a squad now missing two of their most important players last season, including their joint-top league goalscorer. They have Nathan Redmond, but that must only be the start. Can they repeat the trick yet again?