WE are, it is said, a nation of animal lovers.

Even I, hard-hearted Bradders, like the odd creature, and I well remember the tear in my eye as we flushed Bob, our family goldfish, down the loo following his sad demise, after living for about six years in a muddy tank that got emptied once every Pancake Day.

But on Sunday last, I do feel my love of God's little creatures was somewhat stretched.

While driving on the outskirts of one or our towns, it was noted by my "passenger" that a small dog was standing on the side of the road.

"That dog's lost," brought an immediate response from me... I drove on - only to be persuaded to return to the small animal.

To cut a short story long, the dog was enticed into our car, and it was decided by the "passenger" that the dog was indeed lost or worse, had been dumped.

So to the local nick we went to deposit lost dog.

Local nick is not open on Sundays (burglars take note) and a phone call to the big police station informed us we could either keep the dog, take it to the major police station or let it go again.

So, off we trudged, through Sunday afternoon traffic on the 10-mile trip to the big police station.

On arriving there, forms had to be filled in - where it was found, by whom, what it looked like etc.

We were then told to deposit the dog in the kennels at the rear with a very nice police-lady showing us the way.

The kennels looked fine to me, but the "passenger" decided against it and guess what? We took it home again.

We decided to pass by the vicinity of the dog-finding incident and there were a couple of blokes digging a hole.

"Lost your dog?" I inquired. The gentleman concerned had not, but having looked at said dog, got his wife out for a look and it was decided it might belong to someone up the road.

Took dog to instructed house, lady very happy to have dog back, despite the fact she did not know it had been missing, and thanked us for our help.

The crux of the story is that we had picked up the dog 15 yards from its own gate, spent an hour and a half and about two gallons of petrol on the road and took it back to where it came from!

On another note, great game at Sixways last Saturday, home to Brive tomorrow. Practising French now...