BANBURY Borough's Alan Prew and Les Gillett gambled on the extra end of their English Bowling Association pairs championship quarter-final at Worthing yesterday - and lost.

Father and son Ken and Graham Ashby of the Stoke (Coventry) club won the toss for the extra end but gave the jack to their opponents.

Although they had preferred mainly shorter jacks throughout the match, the two decided, after a conference, that Prew should cast it full length and with his first two deliveries attempt to try and ditch the jack. He failed both times.

When it came to Gillett's turn, he was in trouble, but took out the shot, leaving a Prew wood 18 inches from the jack to count. The opposition skip trailed the jack to hold two, which meant Gillett had to resort to firing with his last bowl, but it failed to find the mark and the Borough pair were beaten 21-20.

Earlier, Prew and Gillett had dropped a three on the 13th end to be level 11-11 but soon stormed ahead 20-11.

The pair then lost their magical drawing accuracy, evident so often last week when Borough lifted the fours title and reached the triples semi-finals.

On the 20th end, Prew had drawn two woods tight to the jack but they both went out when Graham Ashby fired. Gillett was unable to draw close with three attempts and was forced to fire, taking out one shot but leaving another, which meant the extra end.

In the morning third round, the Borough pair disposed of College Park, Portsmouth, 28-16.

Gillett comes back in the singles tomorrow when Oxfordshire's other player will be Mike Baylis of Woodstock.

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