The Welshman is in danger of falling off the Main Tour this season.
Matthew Stevens suffered another first-round exit as he crashed out of the Scottish Open at the opening hurdle with a 4-1 defeat to Si Jiahui on Saturday in Barnsley.
The former UK and Masters champion, once a permanent fixture of the top 16, has lost in the first round of the last three ranking events during this campaign.
Amateur Si, just 19 and tipped as a possible star of the future, compiled breaks of 105, 81, and 76 to hammer his esteemed opponent with a dominant display that will see the teenager take part at the venue stages of the tournament in December.
For Stevens, the Scottish Open exit puts more pressure on his tour survival ambitions and there is an increasingly realistic chance that the former world number four could drop outside the top 64 in the rankings this term, with the 44 year-old currently in 67th place on the provisional end-of-season standings.
Elsewhere at the Metrodome, Liang Wenbo won two nervy frames to fight back from 3-2 behind to edge Elliot Slessor in a deciding-frame thriller, while Mark Davis also needed all seven frames as he narrowly outwitted Michael White by the same 4-3 scoreline.
It was slightly easier for English trio Tom Ford, Jimmy Robertson, and Anthony Hamilton who got the better of Peter Lines, Jamie O’Neill, and Tian Pengfei respectively.
Jamie Jones overcame Joe O’Connor 4-2 while Zhao Jianbo recorded the most one-sided triumph courtesy of a 4-0 drubbing of Liam Highfield.
On Sunday, the action continues with Hossein Vafaei, Li Hang, and Kurt Maflin among the players set to enter the fray in the qualifiers.
Live coverage continues on Eurosport and via the Matchroom.Live streaming service.
Click here to view the draw (Times: CET)
