West Coast city teams caught tailing present carrier (5,4)
I believe the answer is:
santa cruz
'west coast city' is the definition.
(California city)
'teams caught tailing present carrier' is the wordplay.
'teams' becomes 'crews' (crew is a kind of team).
'caught' indicates a 'sounds like' (homophone) clue (to catch something can mean to hear it).
'tailing' says to put letters next to each other (to tail can mean to go after or follow).
'present carrier' becomes 'santa' (Santa Claus).
'crews' sounds like 'cruz'.
'cruz' after 'santa' is 'SANTA CRUZ'.
(Other definitions for santa cruz that I've seen before include "South American city" , "Chief town on La Palma" , "Californian city" , "Tenerife's main city" , "Tenerife capital" .)