It should have been the best day of Derek Ryan's professional career, after he achieved a lifetime's ambition by reaching the top 10 in the new world rankings, but defeat in the first round of the World Open in Qatar yesterday, to the unseeded Australian David Palmer left the Dubliner shattered.

Ryan was unaware that he had risen from 12th to 10th in the rankings, but even that news failed to raise his spirits after a bitterly disappointing defeat. "Ah, you've no idea, it's unbelievable," he said, speaking from his hotel in Doha. "It's taken me a long time to get to 10 in the world but it means absolutely nothing to me at this moment, no meaning at all."

Palmer, a 22-year-old from New South Wales who is ranked at 33, recovered from losing the first set to take the next three, including the third which Ryan had led 13-10. "He played well, to be fair to him, but I had my chances and should have won the third. I didn't play badly but just not well enough to win. This is the biggest tournament on the circuit and if you don't do well in the big ones, everyone else seems to catch up - the ranking points I got before will be absolutely worthless," said Ryan, who was the number 16 seed. "I needed to have a decent tournament to go up another few places, or even to maintain my current ranking."

Ryan takes a break now until January's Tournament of Champions in Grand Central Station in New York and despite a disappointing end to his year, he can reflect on the fact that he began 1998 having dropped out of the world top 20 for the first time in three years and ends it as one of the world's best 10 players.