Ireland swept through to a semi-final meeting with England in the European Boys Team Championship at Gullane on the East Lothian coastline of Scotland yesterday.

The Irish hammered Finland 61, while England triumphed by a similar scoreline over France.

Ireland were never in trouble against surprise qualifiers Finland. They took the foursomes 2-0 with Mervyn Owens (Mallow) and Robin Symes (Shandon Park) winning by 4 and 3 over Jaako Makitalo and Heikki Mantyla, while David Jones (City of Derry) and Justin Kehoe (Birr) won by one hole over Mikko Korhonen and Antti Hiltunen.

Ireland's only loser in the singles, completed in pouring rain, was David Jones. He went down by 3 and 1 in the first tie to Mantyla after the Finn jumped into an early lead and was four up after seven holes. Jones had slashed the deficit to only one hole after 13 holes, but Mantyla pulled clear to win on the 16th.

Ireland were licking their wounds last night after loosing the opportunity to win the European Youths Team Championship for the fifth time as they were humbled by Sweden 6 1/2 in the quarter-finals. But it could have been so very different if the Irish had enjoyed the rub of the green in the foursomes. Dubliner Alan Murray and Limerick's Tim Rice lost the last two holes to go down on the home green to Peter Hansson and Jonas Wahlstedt, while Michael Hoey, the new Irish Amateur Open champion, and Colm Moriarty slipped to a 19th hole defeat at the hands of Christian Nilsson and Anders Hultman.

Captain John Brett was naturally bitterly disappointed. "Things looked so good at one time but they had the stuffing taken out of them with what happened on the last couple of holes in the foursomes."