Tim Henman turned back the years to beat 27th seed Dmitry Tursunov and reach the second round of the US Open, the final grand slam of his career.

Henman, who will retire at the end of September following Great Britain's Davis Cup tie against Croatia at Wimbledon, put in an impressive display to defeat the Russian who had previously beaten him on five of the six occasions they had met.

The former British number one, a 2004 US Open semi-finalist, won 6-4 3-6 6-3 6-4 in two hours and 44 minutes with a performance that highlighted his renowned chip and charge, serve and volley style while also capitalising on his opponent's big serve to return in kind with some powerful winning forehands.

The first set went with service to 4-4 before Henman was rewarded with a break of the Tursunov serve to take a 5-4 lead.

Henman had gone to the net 13 times at that stage, winning 10 points for his troubles as he served for the set.

With a set point at 40-30 up, Henman's first serve was called long and the Englishman chose to take a long, hard look at the ball mark on the other side of the net.

If that contributed to him losing the next two points it became irrelevant as Henman got back to deuce and from there went on to close out the set.

Tursunov was not about to surrender meekly, however, and soon put the Henman serve under pressure while cranking up his own delivery.

The Russian had a break point at 2-1 in the second but Henman held his nerve to take the game. It was a temporary reprieve, Tursunov maintaining the pressure to break Henman's serve at the next opportunity to take a 4-2 lead from which point he had little problem in levelling the match at 1-1.

Henman came out strongly in the third set, breaking the 27th seed in the second game only for the Russian to break straight back.

Tursunov won a player challenge as he faced a break point at 4-3 down but when the point was replayed Henman won it again to leave him serving for the set at 5-3 as the match moved into its third hour.

Henman duly wrapped up the third set and again started the next strongly, earning two break points as a frustrated Tursunov looked to be losing his cool. Yet the Russian managed to hold the opening game by ripping a forehand past Henman from behind the baseline.

At 5-4 up, Henman served for the match and a big service game allowed the Briton to keep his grand slam career alive.