Could he be a beastly Aberdonian? (5)
I believe the answer is:
angus
'could he be a beastly aberdonian?' is the definition.
The answer is a person as well as being a singular noun. This is suggested by the definition.
'could he be a' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'he' could be 'gus' and 'gus' is found within the answer.
'a' could be 'an' and 'an' is present in the answer.
This accounts for all the letters.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for angus that I've seen before include "Scot" , "A snug breed from Aberdeen" , "Scottish cattle area" , "Scots man's name" , "Steer" .)