Rafael Nadal was defeated 6-3 6-7(6) 6-4 by Alexandr Dolgopolov in round one at The Queen’s Club on Tuesday afternoon.
The former world number one, who won his first title on grass for five years in Stuttgart at the weekend, had not featured at the Wimbledon warm-up tournament in London since 2011.
However, it appeared that Nadal was going to suffer an exit in straight sets when he lost the opener to his Ukrainian opponent, with the 26-year-old then going on to earn himself a match point in the second-set tie-breaker.
Nadal rallied, though, to eventually win that set, which forced the encounter into a decider in the process.
It then appeared that the Spaniard was going to ease to victory when he opened up a 4-2 lead, only for Dolgopolov, in front of watching Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho, to win the next four games in a row to secure a shock win.
Dolgopolov, who lost his last three first-round matches at Queen’s, will now take on Guillermo Garcia-Lopez for a place in round three.
