Nick Kyrgios' Australian Open comeback was short-lived as he went down in straight sets to Jacob Fearnley.

A rowdy crowd packed into John Cain Arena for Monday's first-round tie, with Kyrgios - the 2022 Wimbledon runner-up - making his first appearance at his home grand slam in three years.

Yet in just his third Tour-level singles match since the start of the 2023 season, Kyrgios lost 7-6 (7-3) 6-3 7-6 (7-2) to Britain's Fearnley.

Kyrgios, who is unranked, appeared to be struggling with an abdominal issue early in the match, and at one stage required a medical timeout.

And he never managed to recover despite forcing two tie-breaks, as his opponent, who moved up 547 ranking places last year, into the top 100, picked up just a third career win at ATP Tour level.

Kyrgios was not the only big name to suffer through injury at Melbourne Park, as 10th seed Grigor Dimitrov was forced to withdraw hurt from his meeting with Francesco Passaro.

Data Debrief: No luck for Nick

Kyrgios had the crowd on his side, but Fearnley did brilliantly to handle the pressure and control his side of the court, inflicting a rare opening-round defeat on his opponent in the process.

This was just Kyrgios' second first-round loss at the Australian Open from 10 such matches. He also went down to Milos Raonic in 2019.

Kyrgios also does not like facing British players. He has a 5-10 record against them, though this was his first grand slam loss to a British player other than Andy Murray.