Aussie spinner O'keefe feels lucky to pick six-fer in India

Left-arm spinner Steve O’Keefe, who effected Indian middle and lower-order collapse with a six-wicket haul on Friday, said that the host batsmen were unlucky to have nicked the ball and being caught.

“It’s amazing how things can quickly change over here. I was none for 30 off nine overs, probably didn’t bowl very well at all in my first six overs. And then, it all just happened really quickly, and I guess that’s the sort of wicket it is.

“We played and missed a lot of balls and fortunately for us, they nicked them and we caught them. So it was a good day to be a part of and well finished off by the batters,” said O’Keefe after finishing with figures of six for 35.

The 32-year-old said India, who were shot out for 105 in reply to Australia’s first innings score of 260, thanks to his heroics, can still fight back with three days left.

“It hasn’t really sunk in yet. It will, if that contributes to a win. Right now, we’ll enjoy we had a good day, but that’s all it is. It was a good day’s cricket. We all know how good this Indian team is, how well they can bat, and even in spinning condition they are exceptional players.

“They’re all match winners, they’re top seven, you’re even argue Jadeja, the top 8, so we have our work cut out for us.  We are 300 ahead, let’s get more and let’s create 10 chances tomorrow and hold on to it,” he said.

O’Keefe, who created mayhem after change of ends, said it was just looking at India’s Ravichandran Ashwin bowling his overs from the opposite end that helped in deciding to ask his team’s offie, the experienced Nathan Lyon, to do so.

“We were debating it in the changing rooms. Mitchell Starc and I didn’t really care which end we bowled at. The idea was for Mitch to create some footmarks for Nathan outside off stump at that end, so I think the move was just to bowl Nathan from that end because that’s the end that Ashwin’s bowled his overs from.

“(Ravindra) Jadeja probably bowled most of his overs at that (his own) end, so it was just good fortune, I guess. When I started to bowl my first six overs, I think I went probably back to my comfort zone, which is what I bowl in Australia.

It was just probably going a bit over the top and whenever I was trying to bowl quick, it was too full. It was ordinary bowling the first six overs. I’d been working in the nets with some other variations, just changing the seam angle and arm angle.  It made all the difference,” he explained.

Happy to see a track that afforded so much help to the tweakers unlike in Australia, O’Keefe said: “It’s always nice to see a spinning wicket. You don’t get to see it too often back in Australia. But in saying that, you know in seeing a wicket like that, there’s going to be a lot of onus and you’re going to have to carry a lot of work load. Heavy lifting has to be done by spinners on that wicket.

“We are just fortunate we’ve got someone like Mitchell Starc and Hazlewood, two of the best bowlers in the world, who can back you up. And their time will come for sure, whether the ball’s reversing or moving sideways. So it’s nice to see spinning conditions, but you know you have a job to do.”