Rule in court facing criticism (9)
I believe the answer is:
yardstick
'rule' is the definition.
(yardstick is a kind of rule)
'court facing criticism' is the wordplay.
'court' becomes 'yard' (I've seen this before**).
'facing' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'criticism' becomes 'stick' (I've seen this before).
'yard'+'stick'='YARDSTICK'
'in' is the link.
(Other definitions for yardstick that I've seen before include "Gauge" , "Standard of measurement" , "Measure against which to make comparison" , "Guideline" , "Benchmark" .)