Aussie press had a field day after victory
Australian press had a field day celebrating the unexpected win for the visitors who were dubbed underdogs coming into the series against India. Australia inflicted a 333-run defeat on India in Pune to snap their 19-match unbeaten run.
The Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) described Steve O’Keefe’s match figures of 12/70 as a “superhero performance that rewrote the record books and humiliated the shellshocked hosts inside three days”.
Cricket.com.au, the official website of Cricket Australia, hailed the left-arm tweaker for entering the record books as the best ever foreign spinner in a Test match in India.
After the second day of the Test, India coach Anil Kumble had said O’Keefe’s achievement of six wickets in India’s first innings was down to him bowling steady in the right areas.
The Daily Telegraph Sydney, taking exception to the comments, asked what O’Keefe was capable of if he “bowls well”. Of course, this was before his similar second innings haul, after which was done, the news agency wrote that he had “shattered 84 years of Test history in the subcontinent”.
MULTIPLE HEROES
The Daily Telegraph also wrote that “Australia had many heroes” in the first Test. Captain Steve Smith’s 109 off 202 balls was described as inspirational and the most significant of his 18 Test centuries. The Daily Telegraph defined Mitchell Starc’s first innings score of 61 it as “crucial” to Australia’s first innings total while SMH called him a “star” and a “big game player” in their analysis of individual Aussie performances.
Aside from his performance with the bat, Smith’s captaincy also received plenty of praise.
The Australian identified Smith’s annoyance at an overthrow towards the end of the match as a highlight of his winning mentality. The newspaper wrote that while it seemed imminent that the visitors were going to win, Smith wanted to give no quarter.
Australia’s coaching staff also received a good word, primary praise going to former Indian allrounder Sridharan Sriram who was contracted as a the team’s spin consultant.
Iwouldsaythatwe needed something like this for us to get a reality check and understand what are the things we need to work on & keep persisting with it. Even a parttimer can get four wickets if you don’t apply yourself. And I certainly would like to think that that was the case with our batting lineup in this game.