Comes out ahead in sports column, article and the odd diary (4,3,3)
I believe the answer is:
wins the day
'comes out ahead' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't judge whether it can be defined by this definition.
'sports column article and the odd diary' is the wordplay.
'sports column' becomes 'wins' (I've seen this in another clue).
'article' becomes 'the' (the definite article in English).
'and' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'the odd' means one should take alternating letters.
The alternating letters of 'diary' are 'day'.
'wins'+'the'+'day'='WINS THE DAY'
'in' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for wins the day that I've seen is " Becomes victorious".)