Crossword Genius

Fuel in ground, first to come out (3)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

oil

'fuel' is the definition.
(thesaurus)

'ground first to come out' is the wordplay.
'ground' becomes 'soil' (soil is a kind of ground).
'first to come out' means to remove the first letter.
'soil' with its first letter taken away is 'OIL'.

'in' acts as a link.

(Other definitions for oil that I've seen before include "Type of fuel" , "Fuel, lubricant" , "painting" , "Black gold" , "Liquid gold" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.
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