Tim Henman held a narrow advantage over defending champion Lleyton Hewitt before rain disrupted the final of the Stella Artois Championships at Queen's.

The British number one had just held serve to keep his nose in front at 6-5 in the first set before a light drizzle forced the players from the court.

Henman had earlier come back from a set down to beat Wayne Ferreira in their semi-final which had been held over from yesterday, Hewitt also recovering from a set down to beat Wimbledon champion Pete Sampras in three sets.

Hewitt faced the unenviable task of holding serve to take the set into a tie-break on the resumption and, without the benefit of a warm up, did so to his credit for the loss of just one point.

The number three seed then took a grip on the tie-break from the start, Henman putting a forehand out on the first point and in fact gifting Hewitt the first five points he scored with a number of errors.

A double fault then gave Hewitt four set points and he converted the second of those to take the sSending final chunk of message 992790145-2702-HSA. et 7-6 (7/3).