Crewe also struggling, not given capital's treatment (5-4)
I believe the answer is:
lower case
'not given capital's treatment' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both related to communication as well as being singular nouns.
Perhaps there's a link between them I don't understand?
'crewe also struggling' is the wordplay.
'struggling' is an anagram indicator (the letters struggle or wriggle into a new form).
'crewe'+'also'='crewealso'
'crewealso' with letters rearranged gives 'LOWER-CASE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lower case that I've seen before include "small type" , "Not in capital letters" , "What a baggage-handler might do" , "Unlike sentence, initially" , "Minuscule" .)