A new leaf to appear recently (2,4)
I believe the answer is:
of late
'recently' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'a new leaf to' is the wordplay.
'a new' indicates anagramming the letters.
'leaf'+'to'='leafto'
'leafto' with letters rearranged gives 'OF LATE'.
'appear' is the link.
This may not be correct. It may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for of late that I've seen before include "Alternative to 21 down" , "In the past few days" , "recently, not long ago" , "Recently, not long agor" , "In the recent past" .)