“I was like, ‘that’s no fox’, and then just like a bolt of lightning [hit me],” he said.
He did 10 days of research ahead of the auction and noticed that the head lacked a carnassial tooth, which a fox, dog or jackal would have.
The discovery pushed him to make the three-and-a-half-hour trip with his fiancee to the showroom in Bristol to do one final check: count its incisors.
Six would mean disappointment, eight would point to a thylacine.
“I gave Francesca the nod that it was real,” explained Cranfield.
“We went and sat in the car, I said ‘this is unbelievable, this is the holy grail, we’ve got to get it’.
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He said he “almost passed out” when the hammer went down, and still feels emotional when talking about the support from Francesca and his friends.
“As a man of not enormous wealth, I suddenly realised, ‘wow, that’s a lot of money’.
“But I knew that I had done the right thing… everything since then has been a whirlwind.”
He called his friend on the drive home to waxy lyrical about his purchase and its significance, until his pal agreed to loan the money.
“I keep crying about it because…I just have an amazing group of friends,” said Cranfield, choking up.