Adam Scott's tilt at the World Number 1 ranking suffered a setback on Friday morning with the Queenslander slipping to an opening round 5-over par 77 at The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass at Ponte Vedra Beach in Florida.
The 33 year-old made three double bogeys and two bogeys to land in a tie for 133rd place, 14 strokes behind leader Martin Kaymer from Germany who fired a course-record 63.
Scott played the front nine in even par after a birdie-bogey-birdie combination on holes 6,8 and 9 before the trouble kicked in on the tough back nine at Sawgrass.
A birdie at the 10th had him at 1-under par with eight holes to play before back to back bogeys on 13 and 14 had him at 1-over par.
Scott fell short of the famous par-3 17th island green and made double bogey and then found the water again off the tee on the 18th for a second consecutive double to round out a back nine 41.
In other Australian news, Geoff Ogilvy's recent form resurgence saw him a fire a white-hot 6-under on the back nine for opening round 3-under par 69 as the highest placed Australian.
Marc Leishman, Stuart Appleby and Matt Jones are tied in 29th place after 2-under par 70s.
Stuart Appleby finished with a 1-under par 71.
AT A GLANCE
1. Martin Kaymer (GER) 63 (-9)
T19. Geoff Ogilvy 69 (-3)
T29. Matt Jones 70 (-2)
T29. John Senden 70 (-2)
T29. Marc Leishman 70 (-2)
T48. Stuart Appleby 71 (-1)
T68. Steven Bowditch 72 (E)
T85. Aaron Baddeley 73 (+1)
T101. Greg Chalmers 74 (+2)
T133. Adam Scott 77 (+5)