Prakash Amritraj maintained his stranglehold over Karan Rastogi, routing him for the third consecutive time in a final to complete a hat-trick of ITF Futures titles here on Saturday.
In a completely one-sided encounter, which lasted barely an hour, Prakash displayed an array of shots as he outplayed the top seed 6-3, 6-1 to emerge winner for the third week in a row in the USD 10,000 event.
“The best thing that I have done on this tour is keep my focus and take one step at a time. My goal was to maintain the level that I achieved in Chandigarh and Dehradun,” Prakash said after the summit clash.
Prakash served exceptionally well, sending down three aces in the first set besides having a better first serve percentage.
Karan did have his share of chances on Prakash’s serve but they went abegging as he failed to land the winners. The top seed led 40-0 in the fourth game but lost it from there as he hit his returns outside or in to the nets.
It was smooth sailing for Prakash as Karan had no answer to his fierce serves. The fifth seed was also clinical close to the nets, hitting some excellent drop shots. Leading 5-3, Prakash broke Karan once again in the ninth game to clinch the opener.

Lopsided
The second set was even more lopsided as Prakash did not allow the top seed to open his account until the fifth game.
Karan struggled to keep pace with Prakash on the baseline and with his serve also being inconsistent, committing seven double faults in all, he stood no chance against his US-based rival.