The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 9 letter word COWARDICE
I've seen this crossword clue in The Times
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More clues leading to the result COWARDICE
- Company conflict over gamble shows lack of courage
- Company gamble about conflict shows faint-heartedness
- Quality of chicken cubes added to company strife
- Gamble supporting company fight showing lack of courage
- Fighting under officer, more than one die showing timidity
- Fear those spotted behind bovine are dropping back
- Dramatist confronts nits dismissing first character for lack of grit
- A crowd milling around on glacier maybe showing timidity
- Lacking of courage when Noel is skating, it seems?
- . Noel's cool, showing the white feather
Buddy explains!

The straight part
We know that "lack of courage" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case lack of courage = cowardice.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.
What does COWARDICE mean?
COWARDICE noun- Lack of courage.