THERE are names too numerous to mention, but each of them has a story to tell, a dream to fulfil. On the wall of the ATP office at Melbourne Park this week are lists of the tournaments littering the globe in the period after the Australian Open: in Wroclaw, Andrezieux, Tasmania and Sunderland, as the scene shifts from the full panoply of a grand-slam tournament to one-man-and-his-dog anonymity.

These are the places where those looking to restore former glories — George Bastl, the Swiss who helped to send Pete Sampras into Wimbledon retirement, is among them — meet those looking to forge such moments of their own.

Jamie Baker, from Glasgow, is one such wannabe, an 18-year-old who, on the statistical wallchart of men’s tennis, starts his year as No 664 in the world and the Great Britain No 18. As 2005 unfolds, Baker will be keeping readers of The Times in touch with his exploits in Jamie’s Journey, offering a singular and thoughtful insight into the inner workings of the tennis system and how a tenderfoot tries to make his way through its dense undergrowth.

Before he sets out, in a Futures event in Croatia next week, the presumption will be that Baker loses more matches than he wins, because that is the nature of the sport — that heartache will almost certainly outreach happiness, that he will be confronted with challenges that make him wonder why he didn’t take up something less strenuous, like being a torchbearer for the Scottish Young Conservatives.

Only a very few of those who commit to tennis end up enjoying the lifestyle and play in the events that capture the public’s imagination. Most of what happens goes on where there are no notebooks, no cameras, no courtesy cars, no five-star accommodation, no one pandering to the ego, no Garnier beauty parlours (an innovation at the Australian Open), no hangers-on, no agents and no mates to hang out with.

The devotion has to be selfless; to go to places where you would not normally choose, knowing that a first-round defeat means throwing your clothes back into the bag and heading for another remote airfield. Baker wants it, but he knows that there are hundreds with just as much desire as he has. Whether success or failure — if one can base it in such extreme terms — is his companion may require one shot that makes the difference (who wouldn’t give their forearm for Andy Roddick’s serve, Rafael Nadal’s forehand down the line or Roger Federer’s short cross-court forehand?)

Most players are much of a muchness in terms of shot- making, but the very best have a true commitment to their sport, a willingness to go that extra mile, to run themselves into the ground, to soak up every bit the sport can offer and give as much and more back to it. Baker will. Whether that is enough, who can know? It is the relentless fascination of tennis.

What the British game requires is more people such as Baker, Andy Murray, his fellow Scot, and a handful of others who are willing to commit. In the short term, given Tim Henman’s retirement, whether Britain has a viable Davis Cup future depends upon it.

Baker’s interest in the sport was sparked by watching Sampras at Wimbledon, then crossing the road to his local club at Jordanhill to imitate the world’s greatest collector of grand-slam titles. “I have never really thought about doing anything else,” he said, “from as young as I can remember, I have wanted to be a tennis pro.”

It meant leaving home when he was 13 to move to a tennis performance school in Loughborough, with the uncomplicated blessing of Lynne and Gordon, his parents. Within a year he had what he described as a “disastrous knee injury”, brought about by overuse and his teenage growth spurt.

“I was told it might not heal. I was out for a year, which is a very hard thing to cope with when you’re 14,” he said. “The back of my knee had started rotting away. I had to stop. But it gave me a chance to regroup and I started to write a book about what I needed to do to be successful. A clever tennis player is going to be better than a dumb tennis player.

“The more you know about anything, the more chance you will have rather than relying on other people telling you this and that. I watch a lot of tennis on television and it’s important to remember they are playing the same game I am playing. I wonder what these people are like and also what are the stonewall facts about all these matches, because they are doing what I’m aiming to do. I have been around British players who talk about these players as if they are superhumans. That is being too defeatist. You have to aspire to be them, while appreciating not everyone can be.”

Baker regards this as a crucial year. “A lot of it will be about learning how to win matches,” he said. “There are things in my game that I will always be fine-tuning. I want my fitness to be better and my speed endurance threshold needs to be a lot higher. I had a hit with Tim Henman recently. That was priceless. He was passing on things about patterns of play and what he was looking for when he played certain shots. It was staggering to me that I had exactly the same ideas.”