Withdrawal from English football team before time (4)
I believe the answer is:
exit
'withdrawal' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'english football team before time' is the wordplay.
'english' becomes 'e' (abbreviation).
'football team' becomes 'xi' (I've seen this in other clues).
'before' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'time' becomes 't'.
'e'+'xi'+'t'='EXIT'
'from' is the link.
(Other definitions for exit that I've seen before include "Actor's departure" , "Relinquish the lead" , "walk away" , "Road leaving motorway" , "Outlet" .)