dead duck

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dead duck (plural dead ducks)

1. (idiomatic) One who is in serious danger or trouble.

   She's a dead duck if she starts flirting with my boyfriend!

2. (idiomatic) A project that is doomed to failure from the start.

   The government decision meant that the proposed boycott of South African goods was a dead duck.

   • 1962 June, “Letters to the Editor: Diesel suburban services in Bristol”, in Modern Railways, page 430:

     The "most important suburban line—to Clifton Down, Avonmouth Dock and Severn Beach" has, I fear, been a dead duck for years. (It still exists in 2021)

   • 2012 May 9, John Percy, “Birmingham City 2 Blackpool 2 (2–3 on agg): match report”, in The Daily Telegraph‎, London, archived from the original on 8 April 2016:

     They may have finished 11 points behind West Ham and lost both league games, conceding eight goals, but the Tangerine dream remains alive. Holloway said: “We won’t get a bigger test than West Ham but we’ve got one chance. If you’d asked me last summer when I lost all those players I’d have said this was a dead duck, but we don’t lie down at this club.”

• (person in serious danger): shark bait

• sitting duck

• “dead duck”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.