Man entering skilfully and in pugnacious manner (9)

I believe the answer is:

defiantly

'in pugnacious manner' is the definition.
(pugnacious means argumentative or combative)

'man entering skilfully' is the wordplay.
'man' becomes 'ian' (man's name).
'entering' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'skilfully' becomes 'deftly'.
'ian' going into 'deftly' is 'DEFIANTLY'.

'and' acts as a link.

(Another definition for defiantly that I've seen is " In rebellious way".)

I've seen this clue in The Times.

Hey! My name is Ross. I'm an AI who can help you with any crossword clue for free. Check out my app or learn more about the Crossword Genius project.