The Lankan team overcomes Bangladesh to maintain their tournament hopes alive

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

Sri Lanka 202 (48.4 overs): Hasini Perera 85 (99); Shorna Akter 3-27

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

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the decisive innings segment to complete a nail-biting triumph over Bangladesh and preserve their slim aspirations of making it for the tournament knockout stage intact.

Chasing a modest score of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine runs from the remaining six deliveries.

Yet, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu secured three wickets in four bowls and de Silva ran out Nahida to bring about a thrilling success for Sri Lanka.

The win – Sri Lanka's initial of the tournament after three unsuccessful matches and two washed-out matches against the Australian team and New Zealand – elevates them equal on four points with India and the New Zealand side, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, in contrast, suffered a fifth successive defeat since securing victory in their first match against Pakistan and have been eliminated.

Although Bangladesh got off to the perfect start, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the match to send back Vishmi Gunaratne, they were deservedly penalized for a disappointing fielding performance.

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

Although the Sri Lankan skipper was unable to capitalise, dismissed lbw for 46 one ball after being missed by Rabeya Khan, Perera forced Bangladesh pay.

She registered a debut international half-century, making 85 from 99 deliveries and sharing an significant 74-run stand fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna's impressive bowling figures, fought themselves back to the game, with Nilakshi's removal in the 34th over initiating a Lankan downfall from 174 for four to 202 all out.

While batting second, the Lankan team's starting bowlers Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani restricted Bangladesh to 23 with one wicket down in a lacklustre opening overs and they were afterwards brought down to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty restored their innings, contributing an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket stand before the batter withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was leaning toward the chasing team heading into the last two overs, with merely 12 runs necessary.

Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu Moni and gave away just three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all dismissed as the Lankan team grabbed the win at the death.

Finally, it was a game of nerve. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a several of fellow players as she set herself to bowl the decisive over, kept her composure. Bangladesh could not.

There will be many inquiries about Bangladesh's batting performance. They could easily have been pursuing 270 to 280 with the Lankan team appearing comfortable on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but rather the target was significantly less.

However, the batting side displayed insufficient aggression from ball one, making runs at less than 2.5 runs each over during the powerplay, suffering a initial wicket loss, and finally forcing themselves overwhelming to do.

But no matter what difficulties there are with their batting lineup, if they had seized their catches in the fielding department, that 203-run objective would have been substantially lower.

It required them three efforts to end the 72-run stand second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana being unable to hold a difficult opportunity while keeping to dismiss Hasini Perera on 23 runs before the captain was spared from a caught and bowled chance opportunity against Rabeya.

The batter was missed again on 55 runs and 63, the final opportunity flying right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before finally being trapped leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to accelerate the scoring with teammates getting out beside her.

Afterwards in the batting effort, there was also a stumping chance missed and a run-out opportunity lost, while the second one was a somewhat regrettable, with Jhilik deputising with the wicketkeeping gloves following an fitness issue to the regular keeper.

Sadly for the team, such fielding woes are nowhere near a single occurrence. They've failed to catch 14 chances from a available 27 opportunities at this competition and boast the worst catch efficiency (less than 50%) of the eight teams.

They are a side who are overall heading in the right direction – they are playing in merely their second 50-over World Cup ultimately – but substandard fielding performance is a prominent issue which requires focus.