Messy American students OTT? Time to be quiet (3,4,3,4)
I believe the answer is:
all over the shop
'messy' is the definition.
(all over the shop means untidy or disorganised)
'american students ott? time to be quiet' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'american' could be 'a' (common abbreviation - e.g. in organisation names) and 'a' is found within the answer.
'students' could be 'll' (two abbreviations for learner) and 'll' is found within the answer.
'time' could be 't' (abbreviation) and 't' is present in the answer.
'quiet' could be 'sh' (both can be said to tell someone to be quiet) and 'sh' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for all over the shop that I've seen before include "in every direction" , "lacking a coherent pattern?" , "Where sales assistants may be" , "in lots of areas" , "dispersed" .)