How Steve O'Keefe's Success In India Is The Result Of His Hard Preparation Overseen By Cricket Australia
He took 12 wickets in the first Test in Pune.
In January, Cricket Australia announced that the left-arm spin bowler Steve O'Keefe was being pulled out of the Big Bash League to focus on his preparation for the upcoming four-Test tour of India. The 31-year-old had just completed a successful return to Test cricket with final-day figures of 3/53 helping beat Pakistan by 220 runs and complete a 3-0 sweep.
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This was a big step for two reasons: one, the value that the selectors and team management deem in O'Keefe and two, the challenge that lie ahead in India, where South Africa, New Zealand and England have all been whitewashed over the past 13 months. And, not to forget, the fact that Australia have lost nine Test matches in a row in Asia dating back to the tour of India in early 2013. In this dreadful run, they have lost four Tests to India, two to Pakistan in the UAE and three in Sri Lanka.
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O'Keefe has a history of injuries, and in the second half of 2016 found himself repeatedly out of luck. He went to Sri Lanka in the summer of 2016 as an integral part of the Test team's plans, but suffered a torn hamstring during the second innings of the first match in Palleleke and was sent home. Back in Australia, playing for Manly-Warringa in round one of the Sydney Premier Cricket tournament, O'Keefe broke a finger when going for a catch and was ruled out of New South Wales' successful title defence of the One-Day Cup. Also during this time, O'Keefe was involved in a drunken incident in Sydney and fined AUS$10,000.
He only returned to first-class cricket in the first week of November, taking eight wickets for NSW against Western Australia in the Sheffield Shield. In December, O'Keefe was primed for a Test recall against Pakistan in Adelaide but was again sidelined when he picked up a low-grade calf injury during a Shield game. The recall eventually came for the New Year's Test at the SCG, and four wickets in a big win pitchforked O'Keefe into the fray for the tour of India.
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It was then that O'Keefe chose to withdraw from Sydney Sixers' squad during the BBL in order to fine-tune his body and mind to the tough challenges that lay ahead in India. The decision was not unanimously accepted, but O'Keefe was certain about what he needed to do and CA backed him. It was, in his own words, a last chance to stay relevant as a Test cricketer.
Swearing off alcohol and excluding himself from the BBL have proven excellent choices by the left-arm spinner, who ransacked India with 12 wickets in Pune. He is now the proud holder of the third best figures by an overseas bowler on Indian soil, the best by an Australian left-arm spinner ever and the most economical 12-wicket hail in Test history. His success came through diligence - during the lunch break on day two, O'Keefe skipped the food and bowled to Australia's spin consultant S Sriram - and accuracy and an ability to flummox India's batsmen with the deliveries that didn't turn.
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Twelve wickets in your first Test in India, when few had singled you out because Nathan Lyon, the most capped overseas offspinner in Asia, was your team's frontline spinner. Getting a surface that turned from the outset worked wonderfully for O'Keefe, a bowler who appears content to plug away with minimal variations. It was the nagging consistency of his line, length and sliders that made him such a constant threat.
O'Keefe's performance in Pune is stunning because of the manner in which he rattled India's batting twice, taking the wickets of Ajinkya Rahane (twice), Wriddhiman Saha (twice), Murali Vijay, Cheteshwar Pujara and Virat Kohli, who of all batsmen was bowled in the second innings when shouldering arms. That wicket summed up, perhaps, the manner in which the No 1 Test team undervalued O'Keefe, whose tally before Pune was 14 wickets in four Tests. Kohli, with four double-centuries in four successive series, stared quizzically at the surface after he had his off stump knocked back. As if the pitch had demons in it, and not that O'Keefe was capable of producing a delivery to undo him.
Kohli, after 333-run loss that snapped India's unbeaten home streak at 20, level with the existing record, has termed it the wake-up call that his team needed. That dismissal to O'Keefe was also a wake-up call for India's captain, but the bigger picture for India is how their batsmen all failed to adapt on a surface on which the ball spun sharply from day one and the way their spinners were out bowled by Australia.
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The Pune pitch assisted turn sharply from the second morning, was not a raging turner like what South Africa faced in 2015. Totals of 105 and 107 are shocking, but then Steven Smith's 109 also came on the same surface. When you see the context of this innings, given the amount the pitch turned and how early in the piece it did so, Smith's hundred ranks as one of the best by an overseas batsman in India.
And yet none of India's dismissals in their first innings had anything to do with the pitch. In the second, Ravindra Jadeja got one that stayed low and KL Rahul one that spun in sharply, but he was so far back in his crease that his choice of short was always high-risk. Glaringly, India's batsmen came undone against O'Keefe's lack of turn. The arm balls did for Vijay, Pujara, Kohli; the sliders for Saha and R Ashwin. Where was the turn? Where was the dodgy pitch?
This was smart, accurate and probing bowling against very uncertain batting. Like in Mumbai in 2012, India have been left stunned by two overseas spinners. This was a performance, led by O'Keefe and Smith and Lyon, based on exceptional performance and a bold restating of this team's self-belief. Australia are ranked No 2 for a reason, let's not forget. England were fourth when they landed in India, New Zealand fifth and Bangladesh ninth. The difference in skills and belief is all too evident.
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And so Australia, written off by many despite being their status in Tests, now have a 1-0 lead with three to play. They came to India to win, and thanks to O'Keefe's dream match they believe even more that a series victory - Australia's last was in 2004 - is a definitely reality. India have been warned, and O'Keefe is now the focus.