Steve O'Keefe focused on a return after a series of unfortunate incidents

Steve O'Keefe, the Australian spinner, feels the last six months have been hard and he is ready to put everything behind. The 31-year-old was ruled out of the recently concluded Sri Lanka series after injuring his hamstring, he was then fined 10,000 USD for an incident outside a Sydney pub.

The New South Wales tweaker has been very unfortunate when selected for the national side. Having made his debut against Pakistan two years ago, O'Keefe was selected for the Bangladesh tour last October which got cancelled due security reasons. The next time he played for Australia was in the rain-affected game in Sydney early this year against West Indies.

"I think I mainly just felt sorry for myself," O'Keefe told Fairfax on Sunday (September 11). He was referring to his early return from the Sri Lanka tour.

"I'd been home for a week and I felt like I had things under wraps and then you have a couple of drinks and those other thoughts that are sitting around in the back of your head start to come to fruition.

"You think, 'Is that it? Is that your last opportunity to play cricket for Australia?'

"When you go home and you're on your own, you sit down and reflect on it and the Test is on the TV, it's a hard thing to take. Obviously it's fair to say I didn't handle it appropriately at all," he said

The left-arm spinner has 86 wickets at an average of 22 in the last three Sheffield Shield seasons. He is now focused to working his way back to the Australian team and has inflicted a self-imposed ban on alcohol. The main aim for him is to be on the plane to India next year.

"India is there and will be in the back of your mind, but it's just a day-by-day thing at the moment. You've got to be performing well for the Blues and there is a lot of guys out there now, particularly young spinners around the country, doing really well," he concluded.