Crossword Genius

Mean to show anger after five taken into AE (7)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

average

'mean' is the definition.
(I know that mean can be written as average)

'anger after five taken into ae' is the wordplay.
'anger' becomes 'rage' (rage is a kind of anger).
'after' says to put letters next to each other.
'five' becomes 'V' (Roman numeral).
'taken into' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'v' going inside 'ae' is 'ave'.
'rage' after 'ave' is 'AVERAGE'.

'to show' is the link.

(Other definitions for average that I've seen before include "Mean, median or middling" , "Mediocre, commonplace" , "Arithmetic mean" , "Normal; mean" , "just like any other" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
Want a hint initially instead of a full solution? Install my app