Half the lads, on average, are crippled (5)

I believe the answer is:

lamed

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'are crippled' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'half the lads on average' is the wordplay.
'half the' indicates taking half.
'on average' becomes 'med' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'lads' cut in half is 'la'.
'la'+'med'='LAMED'

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(Other definitions for lamed that I've seen before include "Medal (anag)" , "Crippled" , "With crippling injury" .)

I've seen this clue in the Evening Standard.

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