come off second best
verb1
To be defeated in competition; be on the losing side.
- He was elected to the chair of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy in 1827 at the newly-founded London University, and became prominent in railway controversies in the 'thirties, when he came off second best in a dispute with Daniel Gooch about the effects of speed on the human frame.1950 March, Michael Robbins, “Dr. Lardner's "Railway Economy"”, in Railway Magazine, page 153:
- Related terms
- second best