Monty Panesar to Mitchell Santner: India's woes against left-arm spin remain

Mitchell Santner's 13-wicket haul in the Pune Test is not the only time that a left-arm spinner has troubled India.

TOI highlights some other instances post 2010.

Monty Panesar (ENG : 5-129, 6-81 at Mumbai, 2012)
After beating England at Ahmedabad earlier, India were confident of turning over their rivals on the red dirt of Wankhede. Kevin Pietersen's stunning 186 helped England reply to India's 327 with a robust 413.

Monty Panesar, who had toiled for 47 overs for his five-for in the first innings (which included a brute to dismiss Sachin Tendulkar bowled), found the pitch much more to his liking in the second dig. He got Tendulkar again with an arm ball, this time lbw and devoured the rest of the batters with his quickish deliveries to help Alastair Cook's side record a famous 10-wicket thumping.

Rangana Herath (SL: 7-48 at Galle, 2015)
At 3-5 and still trailing India by 192 runs, an innings defeat loomed for the hosts. But then Dinesh Chandimal summoned his inner Viv Richards and belted an aggressive 162 off 169 balls to give Sri Lanka a sniff by setting India 176 to win in the fourth innings.

Rangana Herath, who had gone wicketless in the first innings after bowling 33 overs, then ran through India with a sublime spell of 7-48 to bowl India out for 112 and make it a sombre Independence Day. That he was there in the current NZ coaching set-up for the sub-continent sojourn, seemed like poetic justice.

Steve O'Keefe (Aus: 6-35, 6-35 at Pune, 2017)
At 94-3, replying to Australia's 260, things looked steady for India as they hoped to be on par with Steve Smith's side on the first innings. Enter Steve O'Keefe. The left-arm spinner just landed the ball on a length and challenged the batter's defences as India lost 7-11 to be bowled out for 105.

On a pitch that was dry, a 155-run deficit soon turned into a target of 441 as Smith produced a masterclass on how to bat on a turner and grinded out a 109. O' Keefe was in business again exploiting the pitch, which had by now started to turn ragged and produced identical figures in both innings of 6-35. India lasted just 33.5 overs as Australia won by a mammoth 333 runs.

Ajaz Patel (NZ: 10-119, 4-106 at Mumbai, 2021)
Red soil pitch in Mumbai with bounce is a left-arm spinner's delight. Murali Kartik, Nilesh Kulkarni, Ankeet Chavan, Ravi Shastri, have run through sides in domestic cricket. Ajaz Patel, a Mumbai-born Kiwi found the pitch to his liking too as he got the turn to produce the edges and got the ball to skid on too using natural variations to get batters bowled or lbw. With 10-119, he became just the third cricketer in Test history after Jim Laker and Anil Kumble to bag a perfect 10. He wasn't done, in the second dig, he got four more. His 14 scalps are the most by an overseas bowler in India.

Tom Hartley (Eng: 7-62 at Hyderabad, 2024)
England had no business competing in this Test after India had rattled up 436 in reply to England's 246. At 5-163, and a deficit of 27, defeat, possibly by an innings loomed large. But Ollie Pope produced an innings for the ages like Pietersen had in Mumbai to score 196 and give India a nervy chase of 231 on a crumbling pitch. Cashing in on India's diffidence and lack of technique, Hartley, on debut, exploited the conditions perfectly and bowled England to a famous win by 28 runs in fading light.

Matt Kuhnemann (Aus: 5-16 at Indore, 2023)
A late venue swap from Dharamshala to Indore didn't aid pitch preparation as the venue, known for belters dished out a bald, dry track. India won the toss and batted, but Matthew Kuhnemann bowled in the right areas to exploit the roughness in the surface to have batters stumped or caught at slip. With dream figures of 5-16, India could manage just 109 in 33.2 overs. Nathan Lyon produced an 8-for in the second dig as Australia won by nine wickets.


Get the latest ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 updates, including the full schedule, teams, live scores, points table, and key series stats such as top run-scorers and wicket-takers.