One in the capital finds refuge in empty basement — it’s a gamble (8)
I believe the answer is:
baccarat
'a gamble' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'one in the capital finds refuge in empty basement' is the wordplay.
'one' becomes 'a'.
'in' indicates putting letters inside.
'the capital finds refuge' becomes 'accra' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'empty' says to hollow out the word (remove centre letters).
'basement' with its middle taken out is 'bt'.
'a' put into 'accra' is 'accara'.
'accara' going within 'bt' is 'BACCARAT'.
'it's' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for baccarat that I've seen before include "Gambling card-game" , "game of cards" , "Card game in which players bet against the banker" , "Card-game in which players bet against the banker" , "Card game played in casinos" .)