IT WAS like Glastonbury but without the music. Torrential rain early this week has led to the muddiest and messiest New Forest Show in history.

The forecast remains gloomy on the financial front too as this year's three-day event is not expected to make any profit.

Organisers kept the show going until the official end yesterday evening, but numbers were down, takings were low and tempers were tested.

It was touch and go whether the show would continue on Wednesday afternoon as heavy rain soaked the site at New Park, Brockenhurst, once more - adding to the mudbath that had already formed.

However, thousands of visitors did brave the mud on all three days, the majority of them arriving by car despite pleas for them to use public transport as the parking fields turned to quagmires.

Four-wheel-drive vehicles were used to tow cars in and out the car parks and stewards spent three days pushing cars out of the mud.

Geoff Morgan, show chairman, told the Daily Echo: "We have had a show but it has been a very difficult one, of course.

"Our teams have been working extremely hard putting down straw, wood chippings and stone.

"People have needed help getting out of the car park and the horse boxes have been difficult because they are so heavy. We have been using tractors to pull them out. Tempers have remained fairly good!"

He said he does not think the show, which costs £1m to stage, will make a profit.

"This year's show has been generally about preserving its annual status," he said. "We don't know figures yet but I would have thought the vast amount of wood chippings, straw and stone used to make the ground better will eat into any profit margins. We don't expect to make a profit."

Stewards who gave up a week of their time - many taking annual leave to help at the show - had to deal with criticism and complaints from fed-up visitors.

Mr Morgan said: "We have had no end of concern from members of the public about their cars. We have also had a lot of flak about the state of the ground.

"We have 350 stewards who are working voluntarily and they have pulled all the stops out, but have put up with a lot."

It is the third year in a row that the weather has been unkind to the event.

Last year, soaring temperatures of 35 degrees Celsius kept many people away from the show and others suffered heat stroke and nausea, resulting in more than 10,000 less visitors than expected.

And in 2005 - another wet year, but not as wet as this year - the show made a tiny profit of just £1,280, compared with £165,000 in 2004 and £151,000 in 2003.

Jackie Neylon, spokesman for the New Forest Show, was keeping positive. She said: "When it was absolutely pouring with rain at about 4pm on Wednesday, we had to discuss contingency plans for how to cope with the weather.

"But we never contemplated cancelling the show - there would have to be a monsoon or earthquake before that happened. There is almost a Dunkirk spirit."

She said visitor numbers were up on last year on Tuesday, but down on Wednesday and Thursday.

The Kings Troop Royal Horse Artillery was the main attraction at this year's show and successfully entered the arena to show off their horsemanship on all three days.