Poles follow day before a poor bet (5)
I believe the answer is:
evens
'before a poor bet' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'poles follow day' is the wordplay.
'poles' becomes 'NS' (north and south poles).
'follow' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'day' becomes 'eve' (eve is a kind of day).
'ns' after 'eve' is 'EVENS'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for evens that I've seen before include "Level odds?" , "Smooths the odds" , "Odds that win identical sum as the stake" , "50-50 chance" , "Level betting" .)