liniment

The trainer of Annies Lamb, withdrawn from a race at Reading recently following the use of linament on the dog, puts his side of the story I FEEL I must write in response to your article about Annies Lamb's withdrawal from a race at Reading on December 4.

A referee having linament poured all over his clothes while he took a post-match shower.

I use Chinese linaments, one in particular called Zheng Gui Shui, and tell the women it is a 3,000-year-old formula used in martial arts that translates as "straight to the bone." One woman commented on how much that "straight up the bone" linament had helped relieve her back spasms, so now we just call it the "straight up stuff."

Meanwhile, the dressing rooms no longer only smell of stale sweat and linament, but of Chanel No 5 and assorted cosmetics.

Rugby-loving Shipman was even addicted to the smell of linament while still at school in Nottingham.

And if she put some her linament on our players, the opposition wouldn't come within six feet of them.

Standing in the Watford tunnel, with the smell of linament in his nostrils and a rush of adrenalin still in his veins after his first Premiership action for 11 months, it was difficult to equate the sharp intelligence and engaging charm of Collymore with the sullen, graceless character who punched former girlfriend Ulrika Jonsson in a Paris bar and has spent a good part of the last year being treated for clinical depression.

Wine is taken internally, fortified with herbs, cooked into syrups, and as distilled spirit used externally as linament. But apart from such uses, from specific intestinal to muscular ailments, wine is seen as contributing to general wellbeing.

I was lucky becasue we won 4-0 against Crystal Palace and after the game as we made our way back to Saltburn the whole experience had left all of my senses battered from the smell of Oxo mingled with boiled burgers and onions, mixed with the unforgettable smell of wintergreen linament.