Pune: Steve O'Keefe led Australia to one of its greatest Test victories on Indian soil with a superhero performance that rewrote the record books and humiliated the shellshocked hosts inside three days.
Australia will head to Bangalore for the second Test with genuine belief they can pull off what only a few days ago seemed like mission impossible and win just their second series on these shores since 1969.
India have been an exceptionally difficult team to beat at home, but the crushing nature of Australia's 333-run win in Pune - only their 13th Test win in India - has changed the landscape of this series. The hosts showed even less resistance in the second innings, dismissed for a pathetic 107 in 34 overs.
"We kept the foot on the throat; we got ourselves into positions to win in Sri Lanka and we let the opponent get back into the game," Smith said.
"In this Test we didn't let India back into the game after the first innings.
"It was certainly a positive to dominate this whole Test match."
Had anyone predicted pre-game this match would be over by the third day, most would have thought it would be the visitors on the receiving end of a hiding, however it was Virat Kohli's team that was destroyed. Never before have India scored fewer runs in a home Test than here - their meek capitulation ending a run of 20 unbeaten Tests.
This was not only Steve Smith's greatest win as captain, but arguably one of the best performances by the men in the baggy green for many years.
The heroics of Cape Town in 2014 have been the pacesetter in the Twenty20 era, but this has come in alien conditions against the world No.1, who were given a lesson in how to play in their own dust bowl.
Perhaps the series-clinching victory in Nagpur in 2004 - Australia's last win in India - is the clubhouse leader, which places Smith's young side in rarefied air alongside one of the greatest teams this country has produced.
"Coming to India we haven't won a game for 4502 days. Ive been told those facts, it's been an incredibly long time," Smith said on Saturday night after Australia snapped a nine-game losing streak in Asia in stunning fashion.
It would not have been possible without O'Keefe's herculean feats with the ball. His haul of 12/70 not only places him at the top of the tree for an Australian bowler on these shores but was the best return by an overseas spinner in 84 years of Test cricket in India.
"He has got his cape on, he is Superman," Warne said of the man he believed Australia should not have picked.
To put O'Keefe's achievement into perspective consider this. He is the eighth Australian bowler to take 10 wickets in a Test here and only the fifth spinner - joining an exclusive club which includes the great Richie Benaud.
Two days ago, O'Keefe had never taken a Test five-for. He now has two, exceeding even his own wildest dreams. After a decade toiling away on the state scene, the 32-year-old has now become Australia's weapon on the subcontinent.
"I didn't think it would turn out like the way it was today," O'Keefe said.
For the second day in a row, O'Keefe mesmerised India - not with prodigious turn but his lack of it. Ironically, it was the man who spun the ball the least who had the greatest influence on the raging turner.
O'Keefe produced just enough spin to clip the edge of the bat while his straight balls were also dangerous - often skidding into the pads of India's clueless batsmen.
Remarkably, one of those was Kohli, whose mode of dismissal showed how the unlikely scenes of this game have scrambled his thought process. How else can you explain one of the best batsmen shouldering arms to a straight ball from a spinner not known for his turn?
While O'Keefe was the match-winner, Smith was the man who put the game beyond India's reach with one of the most important of his 18 Test centuries.
The skipper could not have picked a more opportune moment to post his maiden Test ton in India and stamp his mark on the series. He arrived at the crease amid a flurry of wickets and rode his luck to not just settle his team's nerves but play them into an unassailable position.
It was Smith's 10th Test ton as captain: only the peerless Don Bradman and Sri Lanka's maestro Mahela Jayawardene have taken fewer innings than Smith's 37 to reach the milestone.
"I rode my luck and had a few lives but you need a bit of luck on a wicket like that," Smith said.
"I was pleased to score a second-innings hundred in India, formulate a different plan to how I normally would and problem solve on the spot."
