LIMPING to his 300th milestone match, and quite possibly to the end of a brilliant career, Hawthorn veteran Shane Crawford has divulged that he is using pain killers to get through games, as well as a super strength anti-inflammatory gel that is generally prescribed for horses.

Hampered by knee tendonitis, the 1999 Brownlow medallist was a shadow of his former ball-magnet self against Sydney on Sunday — gathering just 10 possessions after spending 66% of his 298th match on the ground. It left him in doubt yesterday about whether he would play against St Kilda at Telstra Dome on Saturday night and lamenting the fact that the pain killers he takes orally are slowing him down.

The Rapigel product Crawford is using is described on the horsesupplisersdirect website as an analgesic muscle-and-joint-relieving gel for horses with a "cooling effect". The description contains advice that if symptoms persist a veterinarian should be consulted.

"I actually rub it around my knee," Crawford, who turns 34 this September, said on Nova radio yesterday. "It's just like an anti-inflammatory … the human anti-inflammatory is Voltaren, but it's just a little bit stronger so I use the Rapigel, which is quite good."

Pain relief had not been administered to him via injection, he said, "Because it's a tendon and you don't want to do that to tendons because they rupture and once they rupture you're finished."

Crawford described the pills he took to play as "just a few smarties. It's just the placebo effect, you just get out there and say 'yep, I feel good' and hopefully get through", before admitting that a side-effect of the medication was that it slowed him down. Crawford said yesterday that, after pulling up sore from a particularly strong outing he enjoyed in Perth before the Hawks' week off, he hadn't anticipated playing against the Swans. He has been most troubled by his left knee — it kept him out between rounds nine and 13 — but has recently felt soreness on his right side, too.

After Sunday's game, Hawthorn coach Alastair Clarkson said Crawford's availability was now a week-to-week proposition.

"Tendons are funny things. Sometimes they just need rest, but other times you actually need to keep the load through them," Clarkson said. "Everyone had written him off from the West Coast game, and probably some of the coaching staff as well, but the medicos and Crawf were staggered by how quickly he responded to treatment … that he got himself up to play this game (against Sydney)," he said.

Crawford played 23 games last season and finished eighth in his club's best and fairest but has played just seven matches so far in his 16th season. Out of contract at season's end, the state of his body will determine whether he plays on in 2009.