It's silver for Paul O'Donovan and Fintan McCarthy at Rowing World Cup III 

WEST Cork's Olympic champions Paul O'Donovan and Fintan McCarthy put in a great showing in their final at Rowing World Cup III this morning in Lucerne, Switzerland., but came up just short at the line.

In perfect rowing conditions, they were slowest off the start line, which wouldn't have concerned them as their strength would show in the middle third.

The French got off to the best start, and the Swiss also, who as World Cup series leaders were unbeaten and also fancied.

Ireland settled into fourth spot early on, and approaching the half-way spot they moved up to third, with France still leading followed by the Swiss.

Ireland then began the charge and quickly caught up with both the Swiss and the French, as the Swiss began to overtake the French.

Then Ireland put on the power, and at the 1500m mark the pushed themselves into the lead and quickly took a half-a-length lead over the Swiss.

Paul and Fintan began to lay down a marker as they upped the stroke rate, but suddenly the French overtook the Swiss and began to put pressure on Ireland.

In a tense and dramatic finish it was neck-and-neck as the flying French drew level, and it was the French who just pipped Ireland by the narrowest of margins as they both crossed the line.

It was their forward momentum at the crucial time that saw they just cross the line in first spot.

On Saturday, Paul and Fintan won their semi-final over the Swiss double, but it was a tough race for the Irish pair, crossing the line only a second ahead of the Swiss. 

Paul and Fintan went into the A Final as the fastest qualifiers, having posted that time on Friday in a heat.

The 2020 Olympic champions dominated that heat, finishing a whopping 10 seconds ahead of the next boat, which qualified them straight into the final as they recorded the fastest overall heat time by almost five seconds.

Just ahead of the men's final, in the women's lightweight double final Aoife Casey and Margaret Cremen finished fifth. Having won bronze last year they swapped seats to mix it up as they tried to figure out which works best for them. But they'll be disappointed with that fifth spot, having been steadily coming back during the closing third.