Praise British university breaking routine (7)
I believe the answer is:
tribute
'praise' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'british university breaking routine' is the wordplay.
'british' becomes 'b' (abbreviation e.g. in 'BBC').
'university' becomes 'u'.
'breaking' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'routine' becomes 'trite' (both can mean cliched or hackneyed).
'b'+'u'='bu'
'bu' placed within 'trite' is 'TRIBUTE'.
(Other definitions for tribute that I've seen before include "Something given or said as an expression of esteem" , "Tax" , "Payment from dependent state (historical)" , "Payment to a subjugator" , "Testimony" .)