Davis Cup relegation

Once again the dire state of British tennis was highlighted at the weekend, as the Davis Cup team went down meekly to a poor Austrian team, forcing their relegation to the Euro/Africa Zone.There is no need to say that Andy Murray is one of the world's best tennis players, ranked fourth in the world and a recent grand slam finalist he had little trouble winning his two rubbers.

But beyond that the men's game in this country is embarrassing. Alex Bogdanovic has always looked 'promising' but he is now 24 and has still not got past the first round of a grand slam, won a live Davis Cup game or broken into the top 100.

Andy's brother Jamie is a useful doubles player but by no means a world beater, a permanent teaming-up with Ross Hutchins could help though and give both players some top level practice and exposure.

Other than that there really is nothing, no-one, not even a glimmer of hope. And to make matters worse, the LTA refuse to admit the problem.

All about the kids

Crowds at the home-tie at Wimbledon at the weekend were extremely poor. Andy Murray is an amazing talent and the event should have been sold out, and if not, tickets for kids should have been issued, in fact an allocation should have been given anyway.

The team spirit in the camp was dreadful, every time there was a break the camera man had to go to the Austrian team as they were the only people in the stadium making any noise.

And as Murray pointed out Bogdanovic failed to get the crowd involved at all: "In both my matches I showed a lot of emotion and got the crowd involved.

"You have to take advantage of home support. It should be a huge advantage. That's why home teams win 82% of Davis Cup matches.

"The crowd in my match was very good. In Alex's match it looked as if a lot of people left and the atmosphere was not very good."

ATP Rankings

Basically it is a disaster all round, and it was not unexpected, the state of the game in this country has been awful for at least a decade with the strength in depth non existent.

Spain have five top 20 players (15 top 100), France have five top 30 (15 top 100) and Russia five top 40. GB have one player in the top 162, not quite the same.

Something needs to be done, and with most problems the first thing to do is admit there is a problem, something the LTA are having difficulty with.