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And now having read the rest of the thread I understand the significance of the phrase. Thanks once again to all contributors.

Same here - I'd pencilled brackets round the extra words hiding that 'i' - so could only find it in the 35ac clue.
By the way. 25dn can be found in Collins, so accessing the ODE is somewhat supererogatory - OneLook gets you there, though that feels rather like cheating.

Hi all, I filled the grid but can't get the phrase. I seem to have identified 39a rather than 5d as one of the extra word clues. Maybe I am being led astray by 'champion'. I'm also thinking Wizard of Oz character for the tornado pilot. Could someone tell me where I've gone wrong in picking 39a, please? Thank you.

The clue to 5 Down doesn't need the last two words, it works without it. The 'female' could be not the word you're thinking off, perhaps female dog?! In 39 A the name of the person means 'champion', so maybe just a red herring.

Apologies if anyone else has picked this one up earlier in the thread.

Looking at 16 across I had 'swallowing drug' as extra words. The clue seemed to parse perfectly well without these words and didn't seem to parse with them. Since ACE is a drug, S and G would be extra letters. The phrase (no comeback?) needed a U and N in their place pointing me to 18 across. So what is the correct parsing of 16 across?

I've completed - which is a good result for me as I normally manage just one in five. Presumably this is an easy puzzle.

I think this thread serves a very useful purpose. My GP agrees. We were discussing it this morning when he was reviewing my dosage of an ace (or more properly an ACE) and saying that puzzles like this ward off dementia .

Hi williamseal. I had exactly the same as you although I had discarded it as one of the 8. Someone earlier pointed out to me that the 'depressed sounding' is only 2 letters not 3 as the H is clearly sounded as part of the word. The H is provided by the last 2 words.

Thanks simon9x

All clear now. I really value this forum.

Thank you. That clears everything up!

Piffleworthy, glad I could help.

I too initially had 39a as one of the extra words clues: the nationality next to a possible quarry word were so tempting! Is there any significance anyone has spotted to all the nationalities?

I’ve got a hole in my parsing of 7d. What does the glow-worm signify? I want it to contribute IM I think, but don’t see how/why.