come off second best

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1. To be defeated in competition; be on the losing side.
   • 1950 March, Michael Robbins, “Dr. Lardner's "Railway Economy"”, in Railway Magazine, page 153:

     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.

• second best

• “come off second best”, in Collins English Dictionary.