Renuka Singh Thakur steps up to seal ODI series vs Sri Lanka

CHENNAI:  Renuka Singh Thakur initially broke into the Indian team for her T20 bowling skills during the tour of Australia in 2021. She was someone who could swing it into the right-hander and had a good yorker up her arsenal.

It showed in the two T20Is she played against Australia then. But her impressive performances in the senior one-dayers and challengers meant she had booked a seat in the flight to New Zealand.

While she made her ODI debut in the bilaterals against the White Ferns, Renuka did not get a game in the World Cup.

In the senior T20 league and Women’s T20 Challenge that followed, she had very little to show. But on her comeback to the side for the Sri Lanka tour, Renuka was chipping in with wickets in the format that suits her best – T20s.

As the ODIs came along, Renuka stepped up in the first game, getting the big wicket of Chamari Athapaththu.

She kept angling it away from the southpaw in the corridor of uncertainty before the Lanka skipper edged one behind. Renuka came back in the middle overs and registered her then career-best of 3/29 as India took a 1-0 lead.

On Monday, in the second ODI, Renuka picked up from where she left off on Friday. It took her just four deliveries to remove Hasini Perera as Renuka broke the southpaw’s defence, hitting the top of the off-stump. Renuka bettered her career-best (4/28) from the last match.

In the chase, Indian openers Smriti Mandhana (94 n.o) and Shafali Verma (71 n.o) put up an unbeaten 174-run stand, sealing the series. 

Brief scores: Sri Lanka 173 all out in 50 overs (Kanchana 47 n.o, Renuka 4/28)  lost to India 174/0 in 25.4 overs (Smriti 94 n.o, Shafali 71 n.o).