Nick Kyrgios will struggle to earn a seeding for the French Open, which starts on May 26, unless he performs better in Rome than he did in Madrid.
The Australian's start to the claycourt season ended abruptly in the Spanish capital, dumped out of the first round of the Madrid Open in straight sets by Jan-Lennard Struff.
Replay
A drop shot-happy Kyrgios was outplayed by the German 7-6 (7-4), 6-4 at the ATP Masters 1000 event.
It was another mixed bag from Kyrgios – who started the week as world No.34 – as he served well on occasion but bombed out with all three underarm deliveries and relied too heavily on drop shots to win some cheap points.
His one outburst occurred after Struff won a point to serve for the first set, Kyrgios breaking his racquet in frustration and earning a warning.
Kyrgios strangely appeared to only have access to two racquets during the match, leaving the court with them sticking out of a leather backpack instead of a regulation tennis bag.
He had been playing his first match since the Miami Open in March when he lost to Borna Coric in the round of 16.
Kyrgios will get more match practice on the red clay in Madrid when he partners with Bernard Tomic in the doubles.
The wildcard pair will play eighth-seeded duo John Peers of Australia and Finn Henri Kontinen on Tuesday.
"Unfortunately sport is entertainment," Kyrgios tweeted in response to a Twitter post questioning the decision to give him and Tomic a place in the draw in favour of a "solid doubles team".
While the first set was close on the scoreboard, Struff dominated play with Kyrgios winning just three points on his opponent's serve across six games and the tiebreaker.
It looked like things would turn around as Kyrgios capitalised on a double fault and some unforced errors by world No.48 Struff as he claimed a break in the opening game of the second set.
But the advantage wasn't to last.
Struff levelled at 2-2, games staying on serve until he broke Kyrgios comfortably at 5-4 to take the match.
In the day's only other first-round encounter, 18-year-old Felix Auger-Aliassime evened his career head-to-head record with fellow Canadian Denis Shapovalov.
Auger-Aliassime dismissed the 20-year-old Shapovalov 6-2, 7-6 (9-7) to move into a second-round showdown with the king of clay, Rafael Nadal.