Irritating pest caught in school yard (8)

I believe the answer is:

scratchy

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'irritating' is the definition.
(thesaurus)

'pest caught in school yard' is the wordplay.
'pest' becomes 'cratch' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'caught in' is an insertion indicator.
'school' becomes 's'.
'yard' becomes 'y'.
's'+'y'='sy'
'cratch' placed within 'sy' is 'SCRATCHY'.

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(Other definitions for scratchy that I've seen before include "bad-tempered" , "Itchy" , "(Of sound) rough, grating" , "carelessly" , "Irritable" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.

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