Majorca, we have a problem.

There’s been plenty of reasonable excuses for Rafael Nadal’s poor play so far in 2014: He was coming off an injury late last year. Hard courts aren’t his thing, just wait ’til the clay-court season. Losing to Novak Djokovic in Monte Carlo is hardly a reason to fret. But now we’re getting closer to something bigger than excuses. Nadal dropped another clay-court match on Thursday, this time to Fabio Fognini in straight sets in the third round of the Barcelona Open. It’s Nadal’s second loss on clay to Fognini this year (in February, the Italian broke Nadal’s 12-year semifinal winning streak in Rio) and his second loss on clay in the past five days.

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The loss caps the worst start to Nadal’s European clay season ever. Less than two weeks in, he’s already at two losses. As recently as 2013, he was getting through the entire two months with two losses.

Nadal has blamed his play on anxiety and his nervousness for an inability to thrive in big points. But on Thursday, Nadal showed no signs of either of those symptoms while saving three match points against the 13th-seeded Fognini to even their second-set tiebreak at 6-6. Serving at 3-6, Nadal played a classic Rafa point, serving Fognini wide, running him back across the court and then setting him up for a winner at the net. At 4-6, Rafa hit a second-serve meatball that appeared to give Fognini control of the point, but he slugged it out and waited for the Italian to make a mistake.

When Fognini served for the match at 6-5, Nadal hit an off-balance two-handed backhand to the deepest part of the court, kept Fognini frozen in the middle as his return bounced short. Then Rafa ran around the ball for a forehand winner to even the match.

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If there were nerves they didn’t show up then, when you’d most expect to see them. No, they didn’t seem to make their appearance until 6-6. Fognini hit a fine, wide serve but Rafa shanked his return to give his opponent a fourth match point. Before serving, Nadal loudly yelling at his box. It appeared to be a plea more than a complaint. Serving at 6-7, Nadal looked like he’d set up the same easy point as he had at 3-6 — serve wide and position Fognini for an easy forehand winner. It all worked, except for the winner part, as Nadal’s forehand sailed a foot long.

Were those nerves? Was that the anxiety creeping in? Forgive the armchair psychiatry, but it’d make sense that Nadal would be calmer serving at 3-6 than he was at 6-7. He had nothing to lose at 3-6. If he lost, he lost. But to comeback to 6-6, to get within two points of what clearly would have been a third-set drubbing of the oft-disinterested Fognini, those nerves came right back.

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And now Rafael Nadal has lost two of his last three clay-court matches, almost one month to the day he begins play at Roland Garros as the five-time defending champion. All is not well in Nadal world. Could this be the year he finally loses in Paris? You can almost feel it.

Then again, all wasn’t well in Nadal world in 2014, when he lost in the quarters of Monte Carlo and Barcelona, which had been his worst opening to a clay-court season up to that point. This was the year he was finally losing in Paris. You could feel it. Then he went out and won his ninth French Open in the past 10 years.

There are still two more tournaments before the French. Nadal’s results at those, not at Monte Carlo and Barcelona, will be the better barometer for his French Open chances. Rafa might have a problem, but it’s not time to panic … yet.

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