City skinned Stoke then United lost to you (5)
I believe the answer is:
tokyo
'city' is the definition.
(Tokyo is an example)
'then united lost to you' is the wordplay.
'then' becomes 'tok' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'united' becomes 'U' (abbreviation).
'lost to' indicates named letters should be taken away.
'you' with 'u' removed is 'yo'.
'tok'+'yo'='TOKYO'
'skinned stoke' acts as a link.
I am not very happy about this link. Some or all of it may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for tokyo that I've seen before include "Capital of Japan" , "Kyoto (anag)" , "Large Japanese city" , "Japanese capital" , "Asian capital" .)