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Jess Morrison and Annabelle McIntyre have given the Australian Olympic rowing team a much-needed boost by winning their women's pair semifinal.
The Australians set up an enthralling medal race on Friday against the Netherlands, with their world champion crew Ymkje Clevering and Veronique Meester the pace-setters in the event.
The green and gold rowers had to scrap for a win, coming from behind in the last 500m to topple Team USA by 1.45 seconds.
In the other semifinal on Thursday morning at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium, the Dutch duo led from start to finish and crossed the line over four seconds clear of the field.
Morrison and McIntyre won gold in the women's four at the Tokyo Games, where they also doubled up in the pair and finished seventh.
The Australian team have had four boats miss A finals — the men's pair, the women's four, women's quad sculls and the women's double sculls — with Amanda Batemen and Harriet Hudson considered outside medal chances going into the Games.
They finished fourth in their semifinal, pipped by 0.22 seconds for a place in the medal race.
The men's and women's coxed eights both have to contest the repechage to make the blue riband medal race.
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AAP/ABC
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