Doctor with surgeries ahead of dangerous court action (4,4)
I believe the answer is:
drop shot
'court action' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both acts as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'doctor with surgeries ahead of dangerous' is the wordplay.
'doctor' becomes 'dr' (abbreviation).
'with' indicates putting letters inside.
'surgeries ahead' becomes 'ps' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'of' becomes 'o''.
'dangerous' becomes 'hot' (I've seen this in other clues).
'o'+'hot'='ohot'
'ps' put into 'ohot' is 'opshot'.
'dr'+'opshot'='DROP-SHOT'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for drop shot that I've seen before include "Hit (in tennis, squash) awkward to return" , "strong highball? Hardly" , "Stroke" , "One may land in court" .)