Crossword Genius

Mostly respect a large naval officer (7)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

admiral

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

'naval officer' is the definition.

'mostly respect a large' is the wordplay.
'mostly' means to remove the last letter.
'respect' becomes 'admire' (admiring is a kind of respecting).
'a large' becomes 'al' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'admire' with its final letter removed is 'admir'.
'admir'+'al'='ADMIRAL'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for admiral that I've seen before include "Top-ranking naval officer" , "[NELSON] perhaps" , "Blake, for one" , "Eg, Nelson" , "Navy rank" .)

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