JUDGING by the jeers which rang around the Emirates Arena yesterday when master of ceremonies Dan Lobb happened to mention the topic, the Glasgow crowd aren’t buying into the idea of this revamped Davis Cup format just yet. But this brave new world is coming and Leon Smith is determined to be at the heart of it.

This 3-1 victory against Uzbekistan yesterday means that the 2015 winners of this competition will be seeded when the first-round draw for the re-vamped 2019 Davis Cup takes place at the ITF’s headquarters in London on September 26 – assuming, that is, they aren’t awarded one of the two wild cards direct to the 18-team finals which will take place in either Lille or Madrid in November.

Under the head-busting permutations for the new era of this famous old competition, organisers including Gerard Pique were sure to leave themselves wriggle room to select a couple of lucky teams who will be excused the ordeal of qualifying, instead joining this year’s semi-finalists Spain, France, Croatia and USA in jumping directly to the one-week finals in November. While the only stipulation the steering committee will make is that they are either have a spot in the top 50 of the Davis Cup rankings, or alternatively have at top 10 ATP ranked player in their team, for some reason, Serbia – with Novak Djokovic – and Switzerland – potentially featuring Roger Federer – are believed to be in consideration for these two spots, which will be named before the draw.

But Smith was adamant last night that Britain have as good a case as any to make. Not only did they claim this title as recently as 2015, as of yesterday they were ranked fifth. They can call upon the star power of Andy Murray and Kyle Edmund - and proved their commitment to using the event to bolster their grassroots by inviting 3,000 local kids along to the venue this week.“The important thing was to get a seeding to avoid the strongest nations although it will be interesting to see how the draw pans out with some of the results,” said Smith. “The ITF sent round their descriptor of how the criteria was going to work out for the wild cards and it is going to be very interesting to see how they allocate it.

“It is a tricky one for them to allocate before the quallies, difficult to have objective criteria,” he added. “So I am really interested to see how they do it and their justification of who they give the wild cards to. Clearly we would be a strong candidate, based on the last three or four years in the competition, how we have hosted ties as well. I am not sure what else goes into it but I’m not sure how many other nations would have got 3,000 kids into a kids day in midweek to do something like that for a Davis Cup tie.”

This was Glasgow’s final Davis Cup tie for the foreseeable future – it was quietly confirmed yesterday that they will not be back here in February, in the event that Great Britain do have a home tie to schedule. But the first rule of showbusiness seemed to apply as they left the crowd wanting more.

Considering the more than seven hours of drama which unfolded in this venue on Friday night it was remarkable that Cameron Norrie - with his dad David, a native of nearby King’s Park – should complete his redemption from Friday’s misery to Sunday’s happiness in short enough order to leave a few ticket holders feeling short-changed. With Denis Istomin, on the back of two days’ exertions, calling off in late morning with an ankle injury, Sanjar Fayziev could offer only light resistance during Norrie’s 6-2, 6-2, 6-0 win which gave the hosts an unassailable 3-1 lead. Both captains agreed there was no need to play Dan Evans’ scheduled fifth rubber.

“At the captains meeting it’s very normal that we know the procedure based on what would happen if it’s a dead rubber situation,” said Smith. “It’s my 21st time here, I’ve sat through dead rubbers and, look, they’re not great for anyone. It’s just the way the match panned out today it was quick, about two hours. Everyone wants to see more tennis but there’s tournaments to go to next week and there’s been a lot of tennis played this summer.”

Whether they receive a bye into the one-week World Cup-style finals to be held either in Lille or Madrid, or are one of the 24 teams forced into February’s quarter final, Smith is determined to embrace this new format to the full. Assuming others are preferred for the wild card, all you need to know is the first round will be played on Friday February 1 and Saturday February 2 either at home or away. As all five rubbers, including the pivotal third doubles rubber, will be played on a best-of-three basis, these could even incorporate night sessions.

“What’s happened with the new format has happened,” said Smith. “The vote has gone ahead and we’ll embrace this next challenge because we definitely want to be part of it. Once we find out who we are playing in February or if we get a wild card we’ll look forward to whatever the challenge, whether it’s February or into the finals. We want to be there, we want to see what it’s like and be successful in it. We’ve got a really good team and hopefully we can welcome back Kyle and Andy as well.”

For a supposedly ‘meaningless’ match, Glasgow had still put on quite a show, an estimated 16,000 people attending here over the three days. The onus now shifts to the ITF to ensure that the glitz and razzmatazz which hosts bring to the party is not lost. “This ‘meaningless match’ didn’t feel like it at all,” said the captain. “It was an amazing atmosphere and you saw on Friday how much it meant when there was tears for different reasons at the end of both matches. It felt like a really important, passionate match and I’m thankful to the players, staff and most importantly the fans that came out to support us.

“We work really hard to get that kind of passion behind the team and hopefully the fans feel we interact with them as well to make sure there’s that connection,” he added. “So when the home and away ties come in February I think that should remain. The games will be shorter but as much as there was massive drama on Friday, it was too long for everyone. I think we can have a great time over two days so I don’t see that being an issue.

“Then the responsibility will fall on the ITF to create something very special for finals week - because then you’re removing the host nations that do so much to make these occasions so great. I loved how they did the opening ceremony with the curtains dropping in Belgium. The ITF need to make sure the occasion is unbelievably special because people are used to that feeling at Davis Cup. You’ve got to make sure that remains when there is a finals at a neutral venue.”