A decade back, Stephen O'Keefe hit a six to get off the mark and announced his arrival in first-class cricket. He was 20 years old. He took wickets. He turned heads. He was nuggety. Competitive.
In the period since, he has almost made it to the next level. Time and time again. Almost. Nearly.
Five years back he got the call. Nathan Hauritz is injured and we need a spinner for two Tests against Pakistan in England. Pack your bags. The left-arm orthodox didn't quite make the cut, selectors opting instead to play a kid by the name of Steve Smith whose wrist spin showed some rough promise. Smith and another baby-faced hopeful, Tim Paine, made their debuts in a match against three men who were soon to be caught up in a match-fixing sting: Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir. 
That summer, O'Keefe made another bid for attention by picking up 4-88 for Australia A against England A in a tour match ahead of the 2010-11 Ashes. His 66 was the top score in the first innings in a team that included Phillip -Hughes, Cameron White, Usman Khawaja and that Smith boy again. There was talk it might be his turn, but the selectors asked Xavier Doherty to make his debut instead. Ever hopeful, they turned back to Smith midway through the tournament and then brought in Michael Beer.
Nathan Lyon wasn't going anywhere once he got back. He dug his heels in. O'Keefe, meanwhile, found himself captaining NSW for a brief and not altogether satisfying period before he let that job go and was allowed to concentrate on his bowling again.
It wasn't always easy to get a start in Sydney. Hauritz was there, Lyon was there, the Smith kid was concentrating on his batting more but wouldn't go away and there were a handful of others who thought they could tweak it up. All this in a Sheffield Shield competition that had become a seamer's paradise. Tricked-up result pitches ended games inside three days and spinners were almost redundant.
O'Keefe stuck at it, policies and pitches changed. In 2013-14 he took 41 wickets and was the leading bowler in the Shield. The ultimate reward finally came at Dubai International Stadium in the baking desert sands where Australia played Pakistan in   October 2014. O'Keefe got to wear the baggy green in a game where he bowled alongside Lyon. Smith was there and rolled his arm over too.
O'Keefe bowled 30 overs in the first innings and took 2-107 and then took the only two wickets to fall when Pakistan batted again.
The Australians were thrashed, the selectors blinked and he was dropped for the next game and didn't get close to the team again until late last year when the squads were announced for the tour of Bangladesh, but international politics intervened and the tour was cancelled. O'Keefe would have risked his life to play. Others weren't so keen. OH&S prevailed.
It'd be a bitch if he missed out again tomorrow. That Smith kid, who is a batsman and a captain now, has all but said he should and so, too, has Darren Lehmann who has a vote at the selection panel.
At the SCG yesterday, the 31-year-old was quietly confident that he is ready should his name be in the XI handed to the match referee at the toss.
"I certainly think over the last five years I've got better and better," he said. "The benefit you get of not being picked is you go back to Shield cricket and learn your craft, and that's the best place to learn. I've notched up maybe 40 games since then (2010-11), and you certainly do learn. I'm certainly in a better place than I was five years ago, without a doubt.
"The more you bowl, the better you get. You just get a bit more confidence and belief in your game, you work on some subtleties, but let's be honest, as a finger spinner you're not working with a huge armoury, but you just feel confident on different wickets assessing conditions and batters better than you do and quicker, and that's a huge thing you develop over time with having success." O'Keefe is 31 and now has 191 first-class wickets at an average of 25. He is no slouch with the bat either, clicking along at an average of 29. He flirted with selection earlier in the summer at Adelaide.
Nominated as Australia's first pink-ball specialist, thanks to an extraordinary record in day-night Shield experiments, he was called over to the squad but turned away again.
Teased so many times, he is bracing himself for another rejection. "I'm certainly no guarantee here to play," he said. "The doubt always goes through your mind but you can understand why, they play so many quicks around Australia in these conditions.
"To be thought of as a second spinner I take that that as a feather in the cap and if I get that opportunity then great, but if not it's great to be a part of this squad." O'Keefe has come into contention for this match because there is a tour of Sri Lanka mid-year which he is earmarked for and because the SCG has shown signs - in the one Shield and two BBL matches played this summer - that it favours spin.
"The first (Shield) game we played on it at the SCG it certainly turned," he said.
"That certainly helped when the selectors were picking the squad, given that I've had some success here.
"We've only played the one four-day game here so I guess it is a bit hard to judge, but I've learned my cricket here, I enjoy bowling on this wicket, and hopefully that's looked upon favourably." He has, too, found a way of playing alongside Lyon. "When Nathan's come back the NSW selectors have shown faith in playing both of us together, whether that be the Gabba or the WACA and it's just extra learning experience," he said.
"Sometimes, even if conditions don't suit they put the faith in us as two of our best bowlers here in NSW and that's a great thing."He's a humble, lovely guy Nathan, Who I admire a lot, and fingers crossed we can get that opportunity again for Australia."