Lacking firmness I would follow Florida captains (7)
I believe the answer is:
flaccid
'lacking firmness i' is the definition.
Both the answer and definition are adjectives. Perhaps you can see a link between them that I don't see?
'would follow florida captains' is the wordplay.
'would' becomes 'd' (I've seen this in other clues).
'follow' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'florida' becomes 'fla' (abbreviation).
'captains' becomes 'cci' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'fla'+'cci'='flacci'
'd' put after 'flacci' is 'FLACCID'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for flaccid that I've seen before include "Slack" , "Floppy" , "Hanging loose, not firm" , "Lax" , "Limp, flabby" .)