The LTA had budgeted for a loss on this Davis Cup tie, yet it employed three people to sing the anthems, dancing girls, fireworks, blaring music, another of those MCs who shouts incomprehensibly, a lorry-load of the plastic schnitzengruben-shaped balloons that make an interminable noise and the spread it laid on must have been excellent because, after three sets of Alex Bogdanovic's match, the entire presidential box emptied.

If Bogdanovic had felt isolated on the court, he had only to look up to the stands to see that most of the general crowd had deserted him, too. Even Britain's back-up team thinned markedly once they realised what those who have watched his previous four live matches in this competition had suggested - that “Boggo” does not quite have it in him to win.

It would have been interesting to know what AEGON, the new £30million backer of British tennis, must have thought when it saw the first event after its outlay being played to rows of empty seats. The LTA ought to have taken the tie to the shires. No1 Court is wonderful, but this competition deserves to be showcased in places where the governing body wants the sport to grow. Bussing pensioners in from Wiltshire and Devon does not quite crack it. And where was the advertising for the tie?

Not a banner to be seen at Wimbledon station and hardly anyone in the locale knew that a sporting event was taking place. Should not Andy Murray's face have been plastered on every lamppost from there to Dunblane? It was another PR opportunity squandered, when tennis is on such a high.