BBC SPORT | Tennis | Taylor bemoans lack of strength

British Davis Cup captain Roger Taylor has admitted that it is difficult to see where the next generation of home grown Cup players will come from.

World number five and British number one Tim Henman led the team to victory over Thailand to retain World Group status.

Feature: Henman's heroics

But with Greg Rusedski injured, Taylor was forced to look to Martin Lee, Miles Maclagan and Arvind Parmar to support Henman.

Lee was outclassed by Paradorn Srichaphan in Friday's singles, world number 574 Maclagan was helped through the doubles by Henman, and Parmar lost his dead rubber against Danai Udomchoke.

It's an enormous goal of mine to win a World Group tie

Tim Henman

And Taylor admitted that there was no obvious young talent coming through ready to support Henman and Rusedski and eventually take over the mantle.

"There are good juniors out there but it is a case of converting them to senior professionals," said Taylor.

"There are no immediate players coming through - (Alex) Bogdanovich is one of the better juniors - but I don't think you can throw them into a live Davis Cup match."

But Taylor insisted that it may not be too long before a new talent emerges.

"Anyone who is going to be a good player makes the move very quickly but you just can't see who it is the moment," he said.

Former Davis Cup captain David Lloyd also admitted the cupboard was bare.

"I don't see anyone at all. I don't see any boys or girls that are coming through to be what I would call world-class players," he said.

Martin Lee
Lee was outclassed by Srichaphan

"Arvind (Parmar) and Martin (Lee) have had their chance and they are nice chaps but they are just not good enough - there are some great teams out there."

Britain will go into the draw for next year's World Group, when the team selected to play at home gets to decide the surface the match will be played on.

Henman and Rusedski are both suited to fast courts and an away tie could further hamper Britain's chances of progressing in the tournament for the first time since 1986.

"If we draw an away match we'll certainly be on slow clay courts somewhere in Europe or South America," said Taylor.

"So it will be very tough."

Can GB build on their success? Have your say

But Henman insisted his patriotic performance in Birmingham, while nursing a shoulder injury, has given him extra inspiration to take Britain on a Davis Cup adventure.

Fortunately we were able to get away with it - in the future that might not be the story

Tim Henman

"It's an enormous goal of mine to win a World Group tie having been a part of this type of atmosphere on three occasions and never getting past the first round," Henman said.

"We talk in the big picture of winning the thing but we have to get past the first round and build from there.

"But we need a doubles team because if you can have different people playing on Saturday than the ones that play on Friday and Sunday it's a massive advantage.

"It shows how vulnerable we are.

"Fortunately we were able to get away with it this time. In the future that might not be the story."

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