Tottenham have made some smart if unspectacular moves in the transfer market so far. But there's one issue they can't afford to ignore.
The big spending, gun-slinging days of Summer 2013 seem like a distant memory now for Spurs. Perhaps for the best, too, considering the unholy mess Baldini and the gang made of reinvesting the Gareth Bale Trust Fund. Club transfer records toppled, on what felt like a daily basis, expectations rose like Carl Fredricksen's balloon-strung house. The Magnificent Seven, they said. We've sold Elvis and bought the Beatles, they said.
Only it turned out Spurs had actually signed Hear'Say and a couple of their dodgy mates from the estate. Paulinho, Capoue, Chiricheș, Soldado. The list of crushing disappointments is a long one.
With the bruises of that disastrous recruitment drive still yellowing, and, with a great lump of concrete and reinforced steel to pay for in the Northumberland Park area - in the shape of a dazzling new 55,000+ capacity stadium due for 2018- this might prove to be another summer of careful spending for Tottenham. The buzz words appear to be value and necessity rather than we'll take two of each, please.
And where better place to find value than from a recently plummeted Championship side? Picking the bones of a relegation corpse might have Levy's fingerprints all over it, but in the case of Kieran Trippier, Spurs have picked up one of the League's finest performing full-backs from last season, for relative peanuts. At the very worst the former Burnley man can provide some straight-laced competition for Kyle Walker. Who, if we're honest, has the tendency to let his mind wander at times, to the detriment of his art.
Toby Alderweireld, while not exactly bargain bin cheap at over £11m, already feels like part of the Premier League furniture, after an eye-catching debut season with Southampton. A somewhat minor cog in Atletico Madrid's charge to the Champions League final in 2014, there's a hope that the Belgian can forge a booming partnership with countryman, Jan Vertonghen. To cork some of the holes in Spurs' porous defence, which, last season helped concede more goals than Hull City.
Elsewhere, young centre-back, Kevin Wimmer, has arrived from 1. FC Köln for around £4m. Although his physique might suggest something quite primitive- a 6ft2 cleaving of solid Austrian oak - reports suggest that Wimmer's talents aren't born exclusively from brute strength or the altitude of his forehead; but on technique and game intelligence, too. A man mountain, no doubt, a literal human blockade - no-one put their body on the line more than him in the Bundesliga last season - but also capable of finesse and subtlety. He'll play his way out of sticky situations without much need for encouragement.
So, with Tottenham's defensive thick-headedness identified and actively engaged with, it's perhaps time to focus on some other areas where the stockpiles look decidedly withered. Most notably in the shed labelled Strikers. Providing that Adebayor and Soldado begin their new and exciting lives elsewhere before Deadline Day, as is anticipated, that'll leave Harry Kane and Harry Kane alone to carry the burden of being Spurs' only recognised centre-forward. In four competitions. That's 55+ games, all being well.
The rise of the Chingfordian academy graduate was one the club's bonafide success stories from the last campaign. From seemingly limited but likeable footballing everyboy - whose career highlight reel was so short you'd need to flesh it out with the clip of him dribbling on himself at Old Trafford on New Year's Day 2014- into dynamic, dead-eyed targetman who dropped Chelsea's usually airtight defence like an unfortunate harassment charge, exactly one year later. From understudy to undroppable goal factory in a field mouse's heartbeat; it's been an extraordinary ascent.
It'd be a mistake, however, one bordering on gross negligence, to load the entire ambitions of a Champions League chasing club on the shoulders of a 22-year-old local boy done (very) good. To save Kane from the inevitable pre-Euro 2016 burn-out, then, Spurs could do whole lot worse than plundering QPR for Charlie Austin, who's more than qualified to play as a lone striker. For a reasonable, Levy-friendly fee.
Importantly, as well as his footballing virtues, Austin doesn't appear to have a personality which encourages his team mates to want to punch him in the face. If the reports are to be believed, Saido Berahino might carry twice the asking price as the former Poole Town man - and maybe one day will be twice as good - is potentially twice as much trouble. Whoever does arrive, it's clear Kane can't do it alone.
Not again, anyway.