Chats with mate endlessly next to footballers' partners (8)
I believe the answer is:
chinwags
'chats' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'mate endlessly next to footballers' partners' is the wordplay.
'mate' becomes 'china' (cockney rhyming slang, mate is china plate).
'endlessly' means to remove the last letter.
'next to' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'footballers' partners' becomes 'wags' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'china' with its final letter removed is 'chin'.
'chin'+'wags'='CHINWAGS'
'with' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for chinwags that I've seen before include "Talks" , "Chats" .)