Henman and Hewitt square up

Henman kept his head when things started to go wrong

Tim Henman's Wimbledon preparations took another leap forward as he booked a place in the Stella Artois Championship final with a comeback win over Wayne Ferreira.

Britain's number one survived the early scare of losing the first set to beat the South African 5-7 6-4 6-2.

The match started perfectly for Henman as he broke Ferreira's serve in the very first game.

Ferreira earned the wrath of the umpire

But the gentle stroll took a turn for the worse when Henman tripped over his own feet, missing a set point and screwing a horrible volley long to let Ferreira back in.

The South African took his chance with aplomb, taking the last four games of the set with some powerful play.

Henman stayed calm and broke again in the first game of the second set, which he eventually won 6-4.

Ferreira managed to avoid the unwanted hat-trick of dropping serve on the first game of each set but self-destructed a short while later.

He served two double faults in the third game and earned a warning for smashing his racquet into the ground and then breaking it over his knee.

Henman capitalised on the cracks that were appearing in Ferreira's game to break again in the seventh.

I don't consider this a set-back.... all things considered after Paris to come here and do pretty well it was a productive week

  Pete Sampras

The fourth seed then survived a couple of close line calls to clinch the final set 6-2 and book a mouth-watering clash with defending champion Lleyton Hewitt, who beat Pete Sampras 3-6 6-3 6-2.

Sampras has now lost to Hewitt twice in a row here but was satisfied with his Wimbledon preparations with the start of the third Grand Slam of the year only a week away.

"I was playing well then all of a sudden in the middle of the second set I hit a couple of loose points, he hit a couple of good returns and he just went on a great roll," said the American.

"He played great against me last year in the final and he is going to get better and better as the years go on.

"But I don't consider this a set-back. All things considered after Paris to come here and do pretty well it was a productive week, I played a lot of different players. "