Bad leader not overthrown in middle of battle (6)
I believe the answer is:
tyrant
'bad leader' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both people as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'not overthrown in middle of battle' is the wordplay.
'not' becomes 'nary' (I've seen this before).
'overthrown' says the letters should be written backwards.
'in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'middle of battle' becomes 'tt' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'nary' reversed gives 'yran'.
'yran' inserted into 'tt' is 'TYRANT'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for tyrant that I've seen before include "Person dictating" , "bully - with 17d" , "Despot, dictator" , "Arbitrary ruler" , "Despotic ruler" .)