Strives to follow cheap, unclothed thugs (7)
I believe the answer is:
heavies
'thugs' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'strives to follow cheap unclothed' is the wordplay.
'strives' becomes 'vies' (I've seen this in another clue).
'to follow' says to put letters next to each other (some letters go after or follow others).
'unclothed' means to look at the middle letters.
The central letters of 'cheap' are 'hea'.
'vies' after 'hea' is 'HEAVIES'.
(Other definitions for heavies that I've seen before include "Sunday Times and similar" , "Large bodyguards" , "Informally, hired thugs sound weighty" , "Important people" .)