The Worthing Bowling Club pair had led 8-2, 15-10 and then 17-14 with four ends to play against Cornwall duo Keith Corris (Bodmin) and Roger Priestley (Wadebridge). They dropped a two (17-16) and then two wicks - accidental advantages from deflections off other bowls - turned the match around.

The first helped Corris and Priestley take a single on the 19th end to draw level at 17-17 and they scored a two on the 20th to lead 17-19. The second wick came on the next and fonal end, and decided the match.
Dunne lay two shots up (to lay the match 19-19) after his four bowls were completed, on a full-length jack.

But lead Corris' last wood hit a stray wide bowl and diverted onto the jack and took it to six inches from the ditch. Young could get his none of his four deliveries at the shot wood, which was seven inches from the jack, and a two gave the Cornwall pair semi-final passage 17-21.

They lost the final 21-20 to Essex combination Malcolm Stark and Vic Cole of Braintree BC.

Watch out at the Open
But Dunne and Young are on a roll and that will make them one of the pairs to beat in the Worthing Men's Open at Beach House Park during the fortnight from next Tuesday.

"We were robbed," was Irishman Dunne's categorical reaction.

Englishman Young, the former Sussex team manager for the Middleton Cup, said: "We played really well. They were really lucky. No, we've never had a run as far as this on a competition together. What's our secret? It's like the old saying: it's based on trust and understanding. He doesn't trust me and I don't understand him."

Young pointed up their quarter-final as the probable abiding memory they will take away. After defeating Charles Boone and Brian Holcroft of Norfolk BC in Norwich, 20-11, they got through 24-21 past Tom Birdsey and Stan Lant of Northumberland miners colliery club Backworth Welfare.

He purred: "That was a really good game. For us to get out of that was really brilliant. They'd probably have gone on to win the title if we hadn't beaten them."

Contrasting hands

The rink, east to west, had a wide swinging hand and a tight and more reliable one. Dunne and Young led 6-2 after four ends and 12-8 after 11 until a Backworth six turned up the temperature. Worthing hit straight back with a two (14-14) and they later levelled 17-17 from behind.
Backworth went ahead for a third time, 21-17 with two ends to play, but a remarkable penultimate end restored a Worthing momentum. It brought Dunne and Young a five.

This was the end they will remember. Dunne's third bowl touched the jack to his previous two waiting woods, and continued just behind. His fourth then took the jack to the waiting three. Young's first made it a lie of five shots, then six, in between missed drives by Lant. Young then added a back wood that was a measure for seven.

Lant's work was hampered by Birdsey's earlier bowls that had been left behind up the green, but his next drive removed one Worthing bowl to leave five with a measure for six. However, his last effort motored into the ditch.

On the last end, Worthing, with a Dunne shot-wood behind the jack and a measure for three, gained a two, to step into the semi-finals. But then luck stepped in to become the X-factor, as so often in tournament play.

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