Defender sent packing fell flat (9)
I believe the answer is:
backfired
'fell flat' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both to do with social activities as well as being past participle verbs.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'defender sent packing' is the wordplay.
'defender' becomes 'back' (I've seen this in other clues).
'sent packing' becomes 'fired' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'back'+'fired'='BACKFIRED'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for backfired that I've seen before include "Had a bad effect on the instigator of the action" , "Went wrong" .)
