Crossword Genius

In favour of divisions of hospital strikers (8)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

forwards

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

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

'in favour of divisions of hospital' is the wordplay.
'in favour of' becomes 'for' (being for a particular cause).
'divisions of hospital' becomes 'wards' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'for'+'wards'='FORWARDS'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for forwards that I've seen before include "Attacking players" , "In the normal sequence" , "attackers" , "Football players" , "Facing towards the front" .)

I've seen this clue in The Telegraph.
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