Being an adept with the rope, he controls the craft (7)
I believe the answer is:
skipper
'he controls the craft' is the definition.
The answer is a person as well as being a singular noun. This is suggested by the definition.
'being an adept with the rope' is the wordplay.
'being an adept' becomes 'per' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'with' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'the rope' becomes 'skip' (skip rope is a kind of rope).
'per' put after 'skip' is 'SKIPPER'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for skipper that I've seen before include "being in charge?" , "Shakespeare's giddy youth" , "Captain - one using a rope" , "sea-captain" , "Senior pilot" .)