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on the defensive
Idioms and Phrases
Prepared for withstanding aggression or attack, as in The debate team's plan was to keep their opponents on the defensive , or This teacher put students on the defensive about their mistakes . [c. 1600]Example Sentences
Trump and his Republican sycophants should be asked repeatedly about the breakdowns, harms to people, and basically put them on the defensive.
San Francisco 49ers: DT Kenneth Grant, Michigan — Not too long ago, the 49ers were loaded on the defensive line.
It has also put federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre on the defensive in the early days of the country's short federal electoral race.
And the edge they played with on the defensive side of the ball for nearly half the season simply hasn’t been as sharp this month.
Greenland was already on the defensive about Trump's talk of a takeover, but he sent further shockwaves by implying he might ask to take the island with support of Nato, a military alliance of which Denmark is also a part.
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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