Indian women's pacer Renuka Singh Thakur bemoaned the absence of a third fast bowler after the team suffered a three-wicket defeat at the hands of Australia in the opening game of the Commonwealth Games 2022.

After winning the toss, India opted to bat first. The 18-year-old Shafali Verma played a brilliant knock of 33-ball 48 at the top while skipper Harmanpreet Kaur smashed a half-century (52 off 34 balls), taking the team's total to 154/8.

In response, Australia were in all sorts of trouble at 49/5 in the eighth over thanks to an extraordinary opening spell from Renuka and Deepti Sharma. But Ashleigh Gardner (52* off 35 balls) and Grace Harris’s (37 off 20 balls) scintillating knock under pressure took the team over the line with an over to spare.

Even though she had a fantastic outing, Renuka expressed her disappointment after the match that her team lost. 

“Actually I am not that happy as we lost the match at the end. I got confidence when I took the first wicket. We had our plans for every batter, and they worked. But they ended up playing very well and we lost because of that,” she told the reporters after the game.

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She regretted the absence of Pooja Vastrakar, who contracted Covid-19 ahead of the tournament.

“We only have two pacers, and we missed Pooja in the track, as it was favoring the fast bowlers. The movement was quite good on this track.”

When asked about the feeling of playing in the tournament, the seamer said that she was quite excited about it.

“I was quite excited for the Commonwealth Games as we would be playing cricket for the first time in this tournament,” she stated.

“We will be working on the things we lacked and we will definitely win against Pakistan,” concluded the 26-year-old.

Renuka finished her four-over spell with four wickets and just 18 runs were scored against her.

(INDIA TODAY INPUTS)