Top seed Hemery after losing two finals in Nigeria, this time triumphed over Christopher Diaz-Figueroa of Guatemala 6-7 (2), 7-5, 6-1 to win the GSL Open Nigeria F3 Futures decided in Abuja.
Hemery, born of Nigerian dad (Eno Henshaw-Aigbekaen) and French mum, had lost to Serbian Pedja Krstin seven days earlier at the Dayak Championship Nigeria F2 Futures.
The 279th ranked Hemery had prior to his arrival in Nigeria, for the '21-day tennis festival' won the USA F15 Futures in Florida.
Saturday's final produced a lot of exciting moments for the lovers of the game, as both players failed to engineer a break in the first set with just one break point coming to the Central American in the eighth game when he was 40- 30 up.
The ensuing tie-break decider saw the unseeded world no 755 Guatemalan raced to a 5-0 lead putting pressure on Hemery to make a number of unforced errors before sealing the set 7-2.
The second set dragged till 4-4 with both players not blinking on their serves, but it was the 22-year-old, who got a breakthrough as he broke to love to lead 5-4. He then served out the set albeit his grounded shot which Diaz-Figueroa, who has five ITF Futures to his credit, returned with full force went inches off the baseline as the call by the line judge was greeted with cheers by the fans most of whom are already bracing up for another disappointment having seen their favourite player stumbled exactly a week on the same court.
The earlier meeting of the players had also gone to rubber with Hemery edging a close contest 7-6, 6-7, 6-2 at the second round of the Dayak Championship, but Hemery was third-time lucky, having lost the final of the 2016 Lagos Governor's Cup Nigeria F6 Futures, by surging to a 6-1 final set win.
The GSL Open is the last of the three ITF Pro Circuit tournaments in Abuja which began with the Tombim Abuja Open on May 1. The Lagos Governor's Cup (Nigeria Futures 4 and 5) is the other programme in Nigeria on the ITF calendar for the year and is scheduled for October.
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Caption: Hemery wins in Abuja after losing two singles finals in Nigeria.
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