Leander Paes and Jurgen Melzer snapped Mike and Bob Bryan’s 20-match winning streak with a 7-5 6-1 win over the Americans to make it to the summit clash of the Shanghai Masters here on Saturday.
The Bryan brothers were aiming to win their fifth successive tour-level title, following triumphs in Toronto, Cincinnati, the U.S. Open and Beijing.
It is only their second defeat since reaching the Wimbledon quarterfinals in July.
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Third seeds Paes and Melzer will fight it out with sixth seed Polish pair of Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski, who beat compatriot Lukasz Kobot and Austria’s Oliver Marach 7-6(7) 1-6 10-6 in their semifinal.
Paes and Melzer had defeated India’s Rohan Bopanna and Pakistani Aisam-ul-Qureshi 6-7(6) 7-6(6) 10-4 in the quarter-finals.