Athens: On a black day for Indian sports, multiple Grand Slam champions Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi saw their Olympic dreams come crashing down as they suffered a shock defeat in the men's doubles tennis semi finals in Athens.

The fifth seeded Indian duo were knocked out of the race for the gold by the unseeded German pair, Nicholas Kiefer and Rainer Shuettler, 2-6 3-6 in an hour and six minutes at the Olympic Tennis Centre.

The Indian Express will now have to play the classification for the bronze on Saturday (Aug 21, 2004).

Paes and Bhupathi, the former world number one pair who had won the French Open and Wimbledon titles in 1999, looked woefully out of touch.

It was Bhupathi's serve that came under pressure first in the sixth game of the first set as the Germans went ahead 4-2.

It was the first service loss for the Indians in the competition and the tally doubled soon when Paes dropped the next game.

The Atlanta Games bronze medallist began with a double fault and found himself in a tight situation. Kiefer and Shuettler pounced on the opportunity to close the set in 34 minutes.

The Indians went down 2-4 in the second set after Bhupathi lost serve again and, however hard the pair tried, they could not stop the rivals' march into the final.