Trouble a couple of females, soundly defeated (7)
I believe the answer is:
afflict
'trouble' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'a couple of females soundly defeated' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'a' is present in the answer.
'females' could be 'ff' (the abbreviation for female repeated) and 'ff' is found 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 afflict that I've seen before include "Cause to suffer" , "Beset" , "Vex" , "Ail" , "Cause pain to" .)