Carlos Moya was beaten in the first round of the Idea Prokom Open on Wednesday, unable to adjust to the clay courts in a 7-6 (4), 6-7 (6), 7-5 loss to Spanish countryman Albert Portas.
Portas reached the finals of this tournament in 2001 and eliminated an opponent who won last week in Croatia for his third title of the season.
Top-seeded Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain downed wild card Bartlomiej Dabrowski of Poland 6-3, 6-1. Among the women, top-seeded Anastasia Myskina of Russia defeated German Stephanie Gehrlein 6-3, 6-4.
Moya took a 4-1 lead in the third but Portas regrouped by playing to Moya's backhand.
"I prefer not to be a favorite and it helped me when the public supported Moya," Portas said.
Moya said he had problems with a clay court that had been hit by rain. His victory in Croatia was on hard court.
"The surface was completely different and I had to little time to train here," he said.
In other first-round matches, Argentina's Mariano Puerta defeated fifth seeded Fillippo Volandri of Italy 6-4, 6-0 and Ruben Ramirez-Hidalgo of Spain outplayed Julian Knowle of Austria 7-5, 3-6, 6-1.
In second-round singles, David Ferrer of Spain defeated fourth-seeded David Nalbandian of Argentina 6-4, 4-6, 6-3.
"My rival took me by surprise and I had a weak concentration myself," Nalbandian said.
RSS