Tim Henman had a bit of a hangover yesterday, though he did his best to hide it. He will not have been the only one. The era of British tennis sans Henman has officially begun and his retirement has obviously struck a chord with those who strived, but were never quite able, to flourish in his shadow.

Henman eschewed sunglasses on a bright day at Wimbledon, preferring to squint at the last elements of the 4-1 Davis Cup victory against Croatia’s third team that completed a memorable weekend, the centrepiece of which was celebrating the man who kept his sport relevant. Now comes a collective squint for those as driven as he was for 25 years. It is a significant test of the eyesight.

Henman aside, there are four British men inside the world’s top 300 – as opposed to 11 at the end of 2005 before the LTA’s overhaul and a spending programme that remains the wonder of the tennis world – and of those in the next rump, Jonny Marray requires a second shoulder operation, Alan Mackin and Lee Childs have retired, James Auckland rarely plays singles and Tom Rushby, the British No 12 at No 612 in the world, is considering retirement. Remember David Sherwood, doubles partner to Andy Murray in his first Davis Cup match in Israel two years ago? He has quit as well.

The loss of a chunk of professionals has opened a void between Murray – Britain’s only top 100 player – Alex Bogdanovic (130), Jamie Baker (226), Richard Bloomfield (241), a few floaters in the middle regions and those in their late teens only just figuring on the ATP computer. Over the weekend, Roger Draper, the LTA’s chief executive, said that he expected five British players to reach the top 100 by 2012; yet when he was appointed 18 months ago, Stuart Smith, the president, said something similar should happen by 2008. The net posts keep shifting and not only those on No 1 court that were handed to Henman by the Wimbledon groundstaff yesterday as a memento.

The LTA’s message is no more excuses. It has the most expensive coaches and a great new £40 million home but it cannot make bricks from straw. The problem is that there are not enough players in Britain with the requisite talent, or application, or a balance of both to make it at the highest level. Murray is a one-off, just as Henman was. That is an inescapable fact.

The draw for the 2008 World Group takes place on Thursday. A first-round victory would be Britain’s first in 21 years. Even with Henman and Greg Rusedski to the fore, tennis participation increased by a meagre 2 per cent. They were not able to inspire a generation of players who were able to challenge for a place at the sport’s apex and when Henman says that he is upbeat about green shoots of recovery, one hopes it is more than wishful thinking.

“If you go back seven or eight years ago, we’d have a World Group tie coming up and people would have taken a step back and said: ‘Oh, I’m a bit out of my depth there,’ ” he said. “Now I think there’s a change of approach. People are actually saying: ‘You know what? I fancy a piece of this.’ That’s where I think things are definitely changing for the positive.”

Bill Mountford, the LTA’s head of coaching relations and competition, has sent an intriguing message to the nation’s coaches. “If we can get the fittest, fastest and strongest into our game and keep them there, Britain will enjoy unprecedented success,” he writes. “How to do this? We need to make competition accessible and allow our most promising athletes access immediately into competitions. Athletes, no matter how young, want to compete and so allow them the weekly intoxicating buzz of battle and deeper passions will develop.

“In five years’ time, we will not be measured by how well our players hit the ball. It will be, and should be, all about our match results. As coaches, if we do our part in attracting and then keeping the best athletes in Britain on the tennis courts, our international success will be as good, or greater, than any country in the world.” And, he is serious.

Results

Great Britain beat Croatia 4-1
Great Britain names first
Singles: A Murray bt M Cilic 3-6, 6-4, 6-2, 4-6, 6-3; T Henman bt R Karanusic 6-4, 6-3, 6-3.
Doubles: Henman and J Murray bt Cilic and L Zovko 4-6, 6-4, 7-6, 7-5.
Reverse singles: A Murray bt Karanusic 6-4, 7-6; J Baker lost to Cilic 6-4, 6-4.

Other World Group results
Semi-finals: Russia bt Germany 3-2 (in Moscow); United States bt Sweden 4-1 (in Gothenburg). Play-offs: Israel lead Chile 3-1 (in Ramat Hasharon); Serbia bt Australia 4-1 (in Belgrade); Austria bt Brazil 4-1 (in Innsbruck); Peru lead Belarus 2-1 (in Lima); Czech Republic bt Switzerland 3-2 (in Prague); Romania bt Japan 3-2 (in Osaka); South Korea bt Slovakia 3-2 (in Bratislava).

Andy Roddick swept the United States into the Davis Cup final yesterday by defeating Jonas Björkman, of Sweden, in straight sets in the first of the reverse singles in Gothenburg to give his team an unassailable 3-1 lead. Their opponents will be Russia, the defending champions, who won the two reverse singles to defeat Germany 3-2 in Moscow. Mikhail Youzhny beat Philipp Petzschner to level the tie before Igor Andreev beat Philipp Kohlschreiber 6-3, 3-6, 6-0, 6-3 in the deciding rubber.

Tim Henman has given warning that tennis cannot be complacent when combating illegal gambling. “I have never experienced it but listening to the players talking about it, it seems that it does go on,” Henman told the BBC’s Inside Sport. “We’ve got to be very vigilant about it as tennis doesn’t want to be associated with anything like that. It’s an easy target because it’s a two-horse race. From a player’s point of view, anyone who is involved, I don’t think they should be allowed back in the game.”