Creature doing badly (5)
I believe the answer is:
dingo
'creature' is the definition.
(I have seen 'Wild animal' mean 'dingo' so perhaps 'animal' could also mean 'dingo')
'doing badly' is the wordplay.
'badly' indicates an anagram (letters in the wrong order).
'doing' with letters rearranged gives 'DINGO'.
(Other definitions for dingo that I've seen before include "Want a dog" , "Kipling's yellow dog" , "Yellow Australian dog" , "Aussie wild dog" , "Wild thing" .)