Squad almost came back wasted (9)
I believe the answer is:
emaciated
'wasted' is the definition.
(I know that wasted can be written as emaciated)
'squad almost came back' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
an anagram of 'came' is 'emac' which is within the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for emaciated that I've seen before include "Extremely thin" , "Very thin from starvation or illness" , "skinny" , "wasted" , "Cadaverous" .)