Prayer of Scotsman about English failure essentially (7)
I believe the answer is:
angelus
'prayer' is the definition.
(I know this)
'scotsman about english failure essentially' is the wordplay.
'scotsman' becomes 'angus' (I've seen this before).
'about' is an insertion indicator.
'english' becomes 'e' (abbreviation).
'essentially' says to take the centre.
The centre of 'failure' is 'l'.
'e'+'l'='el'
'angus' going around 'el' is 'ANGELUS'.
'of' is the link.
(Other definitions for angelus that I've seen before include "Prayer at noon and 6pm" , "(Bell calling Catholics to) prayer" , "Church bell" , "RC prayer, its bell" , "Midday prayer" .)