Clash of European knight facing noble Queen (9)
I believe the answer is:
encounter
'clash' is the definition.
('encounter' can be a synonym of 'clash')
'european knight facing noble queen' is the wordplay.
'european' becomes 'e' (abbreviation e.g. EU).
'knight' becomes 'n' (chess).
'facing' says to put letters next to each other.
'noble' becomes 'count' (I've seen this before).
'queen' becomes 'er' (abbreviation for Elizabeth Regina).
'e'+'n'+'count'+'er'='ENCOUNTER'
'of' is the link.
(Other definitions for encounter that I've seen before include "Bump into" , "Meet by chance or enexpectedly" , "Unexpected meeting" , "Meet, come across" , "See 19" .)