The Big Question: Why can't Britain produce tennis players to compete at the top level?

Why are we asking this now?

The absence from Wimbledon of Andy Murray, who has a wrist injury, has highlighted the dire shortage of talent in British tennis. While 20-year-old Murray is one of the most exciting young players in the game and is already ranked No 8 in the world, the only other British player (male or female) in the top 100 is Tim Henman, who at 32 years old is in the twilight of his career.

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For the first time since 1985 only one British man (Henman) reached the second round at Wimbledon. Indeed if Henman had lost his five-set marathon to Carlos Moya on Tuesday it would have been the first time in Wimbledon's 130-year history without a Briton in the second round of the men's singles. The other six British men failed to win a single set between them. Of the five British women, Katie O'Brien, the country's No 1, was the only first-round winner.

Is failure a modern phenomenon?

No. Britain may have the world's greatest tournament but it has not come close to producing the world's greatest male player since Fred Perry, the last British man to win Wimbledon, lifted the All England Club crown three years in succession in the 1930s. In comparative terms, the past 10 years have actually been almost a golden age. Henman, who has played in four semi-finals and four quarter-finals in his 14 Wimbledon campaigns, and Greg Rusedski, who reached the US Open final 10 years ago, both got to No 4 in the world rankings and Murray's arrival looks likely to sustain British interest at the highest level for years to come. The problem is the absence of players coming through. The more significant decline is in the fortunes of British women. O'Brien is the highest-ranked Briton at No 154 in the world. It is eight years since a British woman was in the world's top 100.

Isn't tennis in Britain just too middle class?

There is a strong feeling that the lack of recent success of some Western countries - including Britain, Italy and even the United States, which at the recent French Open did not have a man through to the second round of a Grand Slam tournament for the first time for 34 years - is down to the fact that life is too comfortable for the players. The world's top 100 is full of players from eastern Europe and other developing countries who have climbed to the top through their sheer hunger to succeed. In Britain, tennis has failed over the years to shed its middle-class image, despite the recruitment of figures such as the footballer Ian Wright to promote the sport. At club level tennis remains social rather than competitive. Most people play doubles and it is often hard for juniors to get on to courts in evenings and weekends, when adults want to play.

Is lack of fitness an issue?

Childhood obesity and a general lack of fitness among young people is a widespread problem throughout the country. In particular the lack of young female talent affects almost every sport in Britain; sport is not seen as cool among many teenage girls. Roger Draper, who took over as the Lawn Tennis Association's chief executive last year, has been particularly critical of the lack of fitness and unprofessional approach of many of Britain's players.

Why we can't we build on what success we've had?

The LTA has produced countless initiatives over the years to find and develop champions, but the country's three most successful players of recent times were not the product of LTA schemes. Henman, a late developer, emerged through David Lloyd's private academy, Rusedski learned his tennis in Canada, where he was brought up, and Murray spent his formative years at an academy in Barcelona. Millions have been spent - and largely wasted - on developing young players when the greater problem has been identifying the right talent in the first place. There is great competition among different sports to attract the best young athletes, and tennis has fared badly alongside rugby and football in particular. Nevertheless the Olympic success in "unglamorous" sports such as cycling, rowing and sailing shows what can be achieved, and the LTA is addressing the problem by setting up programmes to talent-spot players from as young as the age of five.

Any sign of hope for the future?

Yes. Under Draper's leadership the LTA has made sweeping changes in the past 12 months. Resources have been focused on those clubs and training centres which provide the best support for junior players; annual funding for "high-performance" centres will increase from £1.2m to £3.4m in the next two years. The LTA itself has been streamlined and decentralised. There is more help for privately-funded academies, a greater willingness to provide financial assistance for players to train abroad, and a commitment to improve the quality of coaching throughout the country. Draper has also brought in a host of world-class coaches to work with the country's leading players. Brad Gilbert, who was Andre Agassi's coach, now works with Andy Murray.

Earlier this year the LTA opened a new £30m national tennis centre at Roehampton where the facilities are the envy of most other countries. Draper also wants it to be a centre of technical, scientific and medical excellence and has recruited other top people in those fields. Draper acknowledges that Britain may have to "skip a generation" but he is focusing on the country's junior players and believes the long-term future is bright.

Can we learn from other countries?

France's example proves that there is no reason why a wealthy Western country should not produce world-class players. France has 12 men (compared to Britain's two) and 10 women (compared to Britain's none) in the world's top 100. A recent study showed that the French Government spends £110 per head on sport every year compared with just £36 in England; although the LTA benefits from a huge annual boost from Wimbledon's profits (£25.5m last year), the only significant support it receives from central funding comes from Sport England (£5.8m for 2007-2008). While the LTA has to spend considerable sums on facilities, the French tennis federation can concentrate its resources on coaches and players.

Almost every French town of any size has good facilities which are reasonably priced for the public to use. In Paris, for example, you can play on outdoor courts for as little as £5 an hour and only slightly more to use indoor facilities. Public indoor courts in Britain are particularly hard to find and might cost £20 an hour to hire. Meanwhile, the LTA estimates that 90 per cent of the 18,000 public courts that are available are in disrepair and under-used, largely because local authorities cannot afford to maintain them.

The good facilities establish a tennis-playing culture; France has 9,200 tennis clubs compared to Britain's 2,500. France also offers more competitive opportunities for young players. Fewer than 10,000 British juniors play competitively on a regular basis, compared with 80,000 in France.

So could a home-grown player win Wimbledon in the foreseeable future?

Yes...

* In Roger Draper, the Lawn Tennis Association has a dynamic new chief executive with a radical approach to improving standards

* Some of the world's leading coaches have been hired to bring on Britain's best players

* Resources are being focused on the clubs and training centres that provide the best support for junior players

No...

* Pressure from rival sports - notably football - shows no sign of abating. Outside Wimbledon, tennis has a modest public profile

* Access to good tennis facilities remains inadequate for large numbers of school pupils

* Women's tennis is going backwards, with the challenge of making sport 'cool' for school-age girls not being met