Australian tennis player Marc Polmans has been defaulted from the final round of qualifying at the Shanghai Masters tournament, after smashing the ball into the face of the chair umpire.

Polmans, the world number 140, was leading Italy's Stefano Napolitano 7-6 (7/3) and had just blown his second match point, in the second set tiebreak, when he netted a low backhand volley.

The Australian then erupted as he hit the ball in anger as it bounced back from the net.

His errant swat narrowly missed the ball person before hitting chair umpire Ben Anderson in the face.

The incident was similar to one that saw Canada's Denis Shapovalov land in trouble during the Davis Cup in 2017.

Shapovalov was also disqualified, but his incident saw the chair umpire of that match Arnaud Gabas sustain a fractured eye socket.

Anderson appears to have escaped serious injury.

Polmans joins Shapovalov, Novak Djokovic and former British star Tim Henman as players to be defaulted from tournaments when their ball abuse saw match officials or ball persons hit.

Henman and his doubles partner Jeremy Bates were defaulted at Wimbledon in 1995 when the young Henman violently slammed a ball towards the net, hitting a ball girl in the ear.

And Djokovic was infamously defaulted during the fourth round of the 2020 US Open when he hit a ball — albeit a lot less violently — and it struck a lineswoman.

While all three of those players have had very successful careers, with Djokovic the greatest men's singles grand slam winner of all time, Polmans has never cracked the top 100 in men's singles.

Nor has he ever made the main draw of a Masters 1000 event.

He will not get any ranking points from this event, nor will he receive prize money.

Had he have made the first round, he would have been guaranteed $29,600.

That match would have been against another qualifier, meaning Polmans had a good shot at making the second round, which would have delivered him a guaranteed $49,000.

The ATP is yet to state if Polmans will face any additional punishment for the incident.

The incident a blight on what was otherwise a good day for some other Australian men, with Rinky Hijikata, James Duckworth, world number 256 Dane Sweeny, and world number 292 Philip Sekulic all securing main draw spots in Shanghai.

They join seven other Australians led by Alex de Minaur and Thanasi Kokkinakis in the main draw.