Sri Lanka beats the Bangladeshi side to keep their World Cup tournament hopes ongoing

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): Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42

Sri Lanka win by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team secured four crucial dismissals in the final innings segment to achieve a heart-stopping triumph over Bangladesh and preserve their faint aspirations of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage intact.

Needing a modest target of 203 on a favorable wicket in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine more runs from the last six bowls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu secured three important dismissals in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to secure a thrilling win for Sri Lanka.

The victory – the Lankan team's maiden of the competition after three losses and two abandoned games against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – pushes them tied on four match points with India and New Zealand, who meet each other on Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, on the other hand, experienced a fifth consecutive defeat since winning their tournament opener against Pakistan and have been eliminated.

While the Bangladeshi side made the excellent commencement, with Marufa taking a wicket with the initial ball of the encounter to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a poor fielding effort.

They provided lifelines to Perera, who was missed on three occasions, and Athapaththu.

While Athapaththu could not capitalise, dismissed lbw for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Perera made the opposition pay.

She achieved a first international fifty, scoring 85 from 99 balls and building an significant 74-run partnership fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna's impressive bowling figures, dragged themselves back into the match, with De Silva's wicket in the 34th innings segment triggering a Sri Lanka batting collapse from 174-4 to 202 total.

During their chase, Sri Lanka's initial pace attack Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23 for one in a lacklustre initial phase and they were afterwards brought down to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Joty reconstructed their innings, contributing an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket collaboration before Sharmin left the field injured for a resolute 64 in the 36th innings segment.

It was in favor of the chasing team entering the remaining two overs, with just 12 more runs necessary.

Nevertheless, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and gave away merely three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all sent back as the Lankan team snatched the win at the death.

Ultimately, it was a game of composure. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a several of fellow players as she set herself to bowl the final over, held her composure. The opposition failed to.

There will be plenty of doubts about the team's batting display. They could easily have been needing around 270-280 with Sri Lanka seeming at ease on 159 for four in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the required total was significantly less.

Yet, Bangladesh lacked aggression from the very beginning, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs per over during the opening overs, experiencing a early batting collapse, and finally making themselves too much to do.

But whatever problems there are with their batting approach, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding department, that 203-run target target would have been significantly lower.

It took them three efforts to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket collaboration, with keeper Joty being unable to hold a challenging opportunity while keeping to remove Hasini Perera on 23 before the captain got a reprieve from a caught and bowled chance possibility against Rabeya.

Perera was spilled once more on 55 and 63, the last attempt going straight to Jhilik at cover, before ultimately being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to accelerate the scoring with batting partners getting out around her.

Later in the innings, there was furthermore a failed stumping and a missed run-out, even though the second one was a little unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the gloves after an fitness issue to the regular keeper.

Regrettably for Bangladesh, such fielding problems are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've failed to catch 14 catches from a possible 27 at this competition and boast the worst fielding effectiveness (48.1%) of the participating teams.

They are a side who are generally heading in the correct path – they are playing in merely their second 50-over World Cup ultimately – but poor fielding performance is a prominent issue which demands improvement.