It was only 29-year-old Henman's second title of 2003 following his victory in Washington, the 11th of his career and his first Masters and it came at the end of an impressive week in which he had stylishly defeated world number one Andy Roddick, Wimbledon champion Roger Federer and triple French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten.

He also beat Sebastien Grosjean to exact revenge for the defeats he suffered at the hands of the Frenchman at Wimbledon and Queen's.

"Andrei's had a great week here," said Henman.

"He has already won one these Masters titles and I would like to thank him for giving me the chance to get a trophy on the board."

In a desperately poor final, Pavel was outclassed at the start, losing his serve in the fifth game when Henman hit an accurate backhand return down the line and again in the seventh on a double fault.

That gave Henman, who only surrendered four points on his own serve in the first set, a 5-2 lead and he took the opener after 27 minutes when Pavel netted a return off a second service.

Pavel, who was only handed a place in the draw just three days before the event started, had surprised himself by making the final after a season in which he had missed six months through back and wrist injuries and, until this week, had won just three matches in the entire year.

As a result, he had slumped to 191 in the world.

Despite losing his opening service of the second set, when he netted an attempted volley off a Henman forehand return which landed at his feet, Pavel showed more spirit and broke back in the 10th when Henman was serving for the set.

Suddenly it was Pavel playing with the greater freedom as he held to love to lead 6-5 before Henman held for a tiebreak.

The tension was obvious for Henman who double-faulted on his first set point but when Pavel hit a backhand wide the breaker was his after 1hr 33min on court.

Pavel, in just his 20th match of the year, could count himself unlucky. He was the better player for large parts of that set and had reduced his unforced error count to just six while Henman sent down 15.

Serve dominated the third set as another tiebreak beckoned and again it was Henman who was the cooler. Victory was his when Pavel netted a return after 2hr 25mins on court.

Henman's win comes at the end of a difficult year in which the British number one struggled to recover from a shoulder injury and saw his ranking slip from inside the top 15 to 40 after his first round exit at the US Open.

His victory here this week will propel him back into the world top twenty and, more importantly for him as far as next year is concerned, probably a seeded spot at the opening Grand Slam event of 2004 in Australia in January.