Forward matter involving FA official in March (7)
I believe the answer is:
preface
'forward matter involving fa' is the definition.
I can't judge whether this defines the answer.
'official in march' is the wordplay.
'official' becomes 'ref' (match official in football, say).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'march' becomes 'pace' (I've seen this in other clues).
'ref' inserted within 'pace' is 'PREFACE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for preface that I've seen before include "Opening words" , "Book's introduction" , "Introductory text" , "Preamble" , "Introduction (to a book)" .)