No doubt when Mo Farah and Usain Bolt, those twin towers of the track, finally confirmed their intention to participate in the upcoming Commonwealth Games, there were relieved calls in Glasgow for trebles all round of Scotland's finest malt.

For with celebrity absentees including mum-to-be Jessica Ennis-Hill and Scotland's greatest Olympian, the now retired cycling czar Sir Chris Hoy, the event was not exactly overflowing with athletic glitterati.

At least the presence of Farah in the distance double plus Bolt, although so far only committed to the sprint relay, adds welcome lustre to the occasion.

But while downing their celebratory drams the organisers should also be mixing them with a drop of whisky sour. For Glasgow 2014 has missed a trick, one which surely would have provided one of the inspiring highlights of the Games.

By omitting tennis from the 17 sports that will be contested over 11 days from Wednesday July 23, Glasgow has dropped a caber-sized clanger.

It means Scotland's very own sporting superhero, Andy Murray, won't be there - much, we gather, to his personal chagrin.

The absence of tennis from the Glasgow 2014 programme means two-time Grand Slam champion Andy Murray will not be at the Games ©AFP/Getty Images



Neither will the Scottish pair Colin Fleming and Jocelyn Rae, who were a rare success for the nation in the last Commonwealth Games in Delhi where they won the mixed doubles gold. Like Murray, they have expressed their disappointment over tennis's absence.

It must be a matter of severe regret too for the Games committee that, after beating the Nigerian city of Abuja in the 2007 ballot to become this year's hosts they then elected to ditch tennis, alongside archery, and instead bring in triathlon and judo.

Of course they weren't to know then that Scotland by now would be boasting Britain's first Wimbledon champion for three quarters of a century, as well as an Olympic tennis gold medallist. But surely it was worth a punt.

Murray's elder brother Jamie, no mean doubles player, who also competed in Delhi where tennis was introduced as a Commonwealth Games sport, also misses out.

Instead Glasgow 2014 has served up a something of a double fault, for a peeved Murray, who says he probably would have competed, now has no plans even to attend the Opening Ceremony as he'll be practising in Florida for the US Open which begins a month later.

Does this smack of a snub?

Murray says he would have liked to see tennis included in Glasgow. "I'm not sure exactly why they got rid of it - there was a fairly good turnout at the last Games. It's a shame."

Tennis made its Commonwealth Games debut at Delhi 2010, and has swiftly made an exit ©Getty Images



Scotland's opportunist First Minister Alex Salmond declares he is "gutted" that Murray won't be able to play in Glasgow.

Well, he would say that because he is aware that a Murray gold medal not only would have Tartan hearts swelling with pride, but might also swell the independence movement.

Not that Murray, who lives with his English girlfriend in Wimbledon, plays any part in it, pointedly refraining from joining the debate.

But he certainly wasn't best pleased when Salmond unfurled the Scottish flag in the Royal Box at his moment of victory at Wimbledon last year. "I didn't like it," he said.

Meantime Murray marches on. So you might say that if he goes on to successfully defend that Wimbledon title his Games absence will be rubbing the Saltire into Glasgow's wound.

And Murray standing alone as Britain's last survivor of the first week of Wimbledon was a situation comparable to England's dismal failure in the World Cup as far as the rest of British tennis is concerned.

The admirable Murray apart - he has largely ploughed his own furrow outside the centralised system with more than a little help from his mum - current British tennis players are a woeful bunch.

Despite bundles of cash being lobbed at them by the Lawn Tennis Association, just like our loads-a-money footballers they can't return the goods.

The stone-rich LTA, along with the English Football Association, comprise the two wealthiest governing bodies in British sport.

The Belgian coach Julien Hoferlin left the LTA last week after six years with a withering broadside, suggesting most young British tennis players were spoilt and lacked hunger.

Julien Hoferlin (right) left the Lawn Tennis Association last week and painted a worrying picture of the state of British tennis ©AFP/Getty Images



It is a message that could be applied equally to English football too.

The moral is that money is not always the answer to sporting ills.

Nations representing the three richest football leagues in the world - the Premier League, Italy's Serie A and Spain's La Liga - all suffered a first round KO in Brazil.

And the World Cup's two highest-paid coaches - Russia's Fabio Capello (£6 million/$10.2 million/€7.5 million) a year, and England's Roy Hodgson (£3.2 million/$5.4 million/€4 million) - were also ignominious early bathers with their respective squads.

Pardon the digression, but while on the subject of funding I hope Sports Minister Helen Grant is finally prepared to flex her muscles over the ongoing vexed issue of financial support - or lack of it - of British sport's have-nots.

There is renewed fury among them over UK Sport's doubling of funding for Winter Olympic and Paralympic sports over the next four years. Understandably aggrieved is financially-snubbed basketball, whose GB women's team have qualified for the European Championships next year but haven't enough money left to participate.

British Basketball Performance chair Roger Moreland is seeking an urgent meeting with Grant as he says there has to be a political solution to the crisis.

Great Britain's women basketball players have qualified for next year's European Championships, but they need funding to be able to participate ©AFP/Getty Images



As he points out, basketball was one of a number of Olympic and Paralympic sports to see their funding from UK Sport withdrawn earlier this year. Interest in the sport remains high and Sport England's Active People Survey results last month reaffirmed its popularity as a participation sport, with hugely significant numbers of young people from black and ethnic minority communities.

But the success has come at a cost for the organisation, as Moreland explains. "The simple fact now is that we have used reserves to fund this campaign and now we need money to field a team at next year's EuroBasket.

"Unless we find a solution to the funding crisis, a tragic situation will occur. The biggest barrier to overcome is not the challenge on the court from basketball superpowers - we can deal with that; it is the system of funding and systematic targets currently in place which penalises our players.

"Explain this to someone from abroad and they look at you in amazement. What sort of message does this send to the thousands of girls who play basketball and dream of representing their country on the world stage?

"This is certainly not the legacy I or many others envisaged from the London 2012 Games. This is particularly so for a team sport which is second in popularity to only football in terms of the 14-25 age group and the fourth-most popular team sport for women.

"I am writing to Helen Grant [whose portfolio includes equalities by the way] to seek an urgent meeting with her. We have to find a solution to the funding issue facing team sports like basketball at elite level. For us, it has become even more pressing now following the fantastic achievements of our women in qualifying for the European Championship finals.

"We have a talented team whose chance of representing this country at Rio 2016 could be snatched from them through no fault of their own." Hear hear! Time for a spot of Ministerial slam-dunking.

Probably just as well broke basketball is not currently a Commonwealth Games sport. Otherwise, like Andy Murray, it probably would be called out in Glasgow.

Alan  Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Games, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.