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Three-time grand slam quarter-finalist Ajla Tomljanovic has endured a poor start to her United Cup campaign, losing in straight sets to Briton Katie Boulter.

Australian Ajla Tomljanovic had a 20-minute meltdown following her straight-sets loss to Katie Boulter, but says sticky notes in her bag helped her keep things in perspective.

Tomljanovic missed almost all of 2023 due to a knee injury and she looked off the pace during her 6-2 6-4 defeat to world No.56 Boulter at the United Cup in Perth on Friday night.

With Alex de Minaur also losing his singles match, Australia were defeated 2-1 by Great Britain, leaving their hopes of reaching the quarter-finals on a knife's edge.

Tomljanovic is a three-time grand slam quarter-finalist, but her long injury absence means she is now a lowly 290 in the world.

But there were still high hopes Tomljanovic would beat Boulter.

No one was more disappointed after Friday night's loss than Tomljanovic.

"Look, I had my 20 minutes of meltdown after the match where I felt like I'm horrible and everything is bad," Tomljanovic said.

"But I needed to get that out of my system because if I just suppress that emotional part of me it's going to linger."

After losing the first set in 35 minutes, Tomljanovic was staring into the abyss at 2-0 down in the second.

But the 30-year-old fought back hard from that moment, creating a series of break-point opportunities to ensure Boulter had to battle hard for the win.

Tomljanovic said her long injury absence taught her losing wasn't the end of the world.

"During the match I had to remind myself when I was getting really down and putting pressure to win that last year I would have done anything just to be on the court and have a chance to battle," Tomljanovic said.

"I remember thinking to myself (while I was injured), 'How silly was I that for so many years I was nervous about the outcome whereas now I can't even have a chance to play'.

"I felt that (feeling) at 0-2 in the second set and it really relaxed me.

"That perspective normally goes away when you're in the heat of battle because it's just about winning, winning, winning.

"So unfortunately, even with time away, I still have to have sticky notes in my bag and remind myself that I have to be very positive with where I'm at now."

Tomljanovic said she sought reassurance from her Australian teammates that it wasn't a case of her playing badly on Friday night, but rather Boulter playing out of her skin.

"I thought Katie played lights out," Tomljanovic said.

"She definitely didn't play like 50 in the world."

Tomljanovic will be back in action on Monday night in Perth when she takes on world No.3 Jessica Pegula in Australia's must-win tie against the US.

De Minaur, who lost in three sets to Cameron Norrie, will be aiming to bounce back against world No.10 Taylor Fritz.