Owen Casey, the Irish Davis Cup player who recently retired from the bread-and-butter satellite circuit routine, continued successfully on his latest mission - to remain an automatic choice on the Ireland team, as long as possible, at Charleville on Saturday.

Casey has to fend off the threatening challenges of the younger members of the Davis Cup squad to be guaranteed priority selection as an international singles player, and he was truly convincing in beating one of the pretenders, Tommy Hamilton, 6-4 6-0, in the Carlsberg-sponsored City of Dublin Open final.

Casey was winning the title for the first time and appropriately enough at his own club, for whom he will be playing league tennis from here on in.

He denied Hamilton the encouragement he needed and swept away to a 4-0 lead. The match, disappointingly brief, lasted only just over an hour.

When Hamilton eventually got off the mark, a net cord helping him to break Casey's serve in the fifth game, there was better hope of a real contest developing. Hamilton, possessing a less rounded game, held his serve subsequently but that was the ceiling of his effort in the first set. The challenger was not afforded that comfort in the brief second set.

Men's singles final: O Casey bt T Hamilton 6-4 6-0.

Men's doubles final: D Critchley and S Harrop bt Casey and Hamilton 6-3 7-5.