Poor whiskey strained (8)

I believe the answer is:

wretched

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'poor' is the definition.
(I know that poor can be written as wretched)

'whiskey strained' is the wordplay.
'whiskey' becomes 'W' (phonetic alphabet: alpha, bravo, charlie etc.).
'strained' becomes 'retched' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'w'+'retched'='WRETCHED'

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(Other definitions for wretched that I've seen before include "Hapless" , "misery" , "awful" , "Most unfortunate, piteous" , "Very unhappy, miserable" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.

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