Sri Lanka defeats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their World Cup tournament hopes alive

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

The Lankan team 202 (48.4 overs): Hasini Perera 85 (99); Shorna Akter 3-27

The Bangladeshi team 195-9 (50 overs): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs margin

Sri Lanka claimed four crucial dismissals in the decisive innings segment to achieve a nail-biting triumph over their opponents and preserve their narrow aspirations of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Chasing a attainable total of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in Navi Mumbai, Bangladesh required nine additional runs from the remaining six bowls.

Yet, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu took three important dismissals in four deliveries and de Silva ran out Nahida to achieve a dramatic victory for Sri Lanka.

The victory – the Lankan team's maiden of the World Cup after three losses and two no-results against Australia and the Kiwi side – pushes them tied on four points with India and the New Zealand side, who face each other on Thursday.

Bangladesh, however, endured a fifth consecutive defeat since securing victory in their initial game against the Pakistani team and have been removed from contention.

While the Bangladeshi side made the excellent commencement, with Marufa Akter striking with the opening bowl of the encounter to dismiss Gunaratne, they were appropriately made to pay for a disappointing fielding performance.

They gifted lifelines to Perera, who was spilled multiple times, and Athapaththu.

Even though Athapaththu failed to take advantage, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Perera forced the opposition suffer.

She registered a maiden international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 bowls and sharing an crucial 74-run fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, guided by Shorna's three wickets for 27 runs, dragged themselves back in the game, with De Silva's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment causing a Sri Lanka collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 complete.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Malki Madara and Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23-1 in a disappointing powerplay and they were afterwards diminished to 44-3.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty restored their score, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket stand before the batter left the field injured for a determined 64 in the 36th over.

It was in favor of Bangladesh approaching the remaining two innings segments, with just 12 additional runs necessary.

Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka removed Ritu Moni and allowed merely three runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, skipper Joty and Marufa all removed as the Lankan team snatched the victory at the very end.

In the end, it was a match of nerve. The very experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a few of fellow players as she set herself to deliver the decisive over, kept hers. The opposition could not.

There will be plenty of inquiries about the team's batting effort. They might well have been pursuing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka looking settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but instead the chase was considerably smaller.

Nevertheless, Bangladesh showed little intent from the start, accumulating runs at under 2.5 runs each over during the powerplay, undergoing a top-order collapse, and eventually making themselves overwhelming to do.

But whatever issues there are with their batting lineup, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding area, that 203 total objective would have been significantly less.

It needed them three tries to end the 72-run second-wicket, with wicketkeeper Joty not managing to grab a tough opportunity as wicketkeeper to remove Hasini Perera on 23 before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a caught and bowled chance against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was missed again on her score of 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity flying right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover field, before eventually being given out leg before wicket by Shorna as she attempted to increase the tempo with partners getting out around her.

Afterwards in the game, there was also a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, while the run-out chance was a slightly unlucky, with Rubya Haider substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves due to an injury to the regular keeper.

Sadly for the team, such fielding problems are nowhere near a one-off. They've failed to catch 14 chances from a possible 27 chances at this tournament and have the poorest catch efficiency (48.1 percent) of the eight teams.

They are a squad who are overall heading in the proper way – they are competing in just their second 50-over World Cup after all – but substandard fielding performance is a prominent problem which demands improvement.