The ace Indian pair of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi was halted in their stride in the men's doubles in the Olympic tennis tournament in Athens on Thursday.

The fifth seeds were shocked by Germany's unseeded pair of Nicolas Kiefer and Rainer Schuettler 6-3, 6-3 in the semi-finals after an hour and six minutes at the Olympic Tennis Centre.

The Indians will now face the Croatian pair of Mario Ancic and Ivan Ljubicic in a play-off for the bronze medal match on Friday.

Paes and Bhupathi, the former world number one pair, looked off colour and never threatened the Germans. It was Bhupathi's serve that came under pressure first in the sixth game of the first set. The Germans broke it and went ahead 4-2. It was the first service loss for the Indians in the competition. They dropped serve again in the eighth game when Paes, who began with a double fault, dropped serve and the Germans closed out the set in 34 minutes.

In the second set, games went with serve till Bhupathi was broken in the sixth game. The Germans did not look back after that and served out the set to take the match and earn a berth in the final.

In the other semi-final, Fernando Gonzalez and Nicolas Massu of Chile beat the Coatian pair 7-5, 4-6, 6-4 to advance to the final.