Dictionary
Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.
knock the stuffing out of en · VERB
Meanings
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(idiomatic, informal) To cause (someone, a team) to lose energy and confidence.
Chelsea knocked the stuffing out of Brighton well before the final whistle when they beat them 1-3 at Brighton.
Added to these woes was the Treasury's demands for across-the-board train operator cost-cutting of broadly 10%. Passenger rail's slow, patchy and fragile recovery had the stuffing knocked out of it once more.
2022 January 12, Nigel Harris, “Comment: Unhappy start to 2022”, in RAIL, number 948, page 3:"This knocks what is vulgarly termed 'the stuffing' out of the case for the prosecution," observed Carlyle, who had been taking a note.
1923, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], “(please specify the page)”, in The Eyes of Max Carrados, London: Grant Richards, →OCLC:
Forms