Better run south of French city (5)
I believe the answer is:
nicer
'better' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'run south of french city' is the wordplay.
'run' becomes 'r' (cricket abbreviation).
'south of' says to put letters next to each other (in a down clue, some letters go under others).
'french city' becomes 'nice' (Nice is a French city).
'r' after 'nice' is 'NICER'.
(Other definitions for nicer that I've seen before include "it's more appealing" , "Pleasanter" , "harder to please" , "improved" , "more accurate" .)