The Lankan team overcomes Bangladesh to maintain their World Cup campaign alive

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka win by seven runs

Sri Lanka took four crucial dismissals in the decisive over to achieve a heart-stopping triumph over Bangladesh and keep their faint chances of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals intact.

Chasing a modest score of 203 on a good batting surface in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team needed nine additional runs from the final six bowls.

Nevertheless, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu secured three important dismissals in four bowls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to secure a thrilling success for Sri Lanka.

The victory – the Lankan team's initial of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against Australia and New Zealand – moves them tied on four match points with India and New Zealand, who confront each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, however, experienced a fifth straight loss since winning their initial game against the Pakistani team and have been removed from contention.

Even though Bangladesh got off to the perfect start, with Marufa Akter striking with the opening bowl of the game to remove Gunaratne, they were deservedly made to pay for a subpar fielding display.

They gifted reprieves to Perera, who was dropped on three occasions, and Athapaththu.

While Athapaththu was unable to capitalise, removed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera forced the opposition regret it.

She achieved a first international half-century, accumulating 85 from 99 balls and sharing an crucial 74-run stand fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, led by Shorna's impressive bowling figures, dragged themselves back to the game, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th innings segment causing a Lankan downfall from 174 with four wickets down to 202 all out.

During their chase, the Lankan team's starting bowlers Malki Madara and Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23 for one in a disappointing powerplay and they were later brought down to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Joty rebuilt their batting effort, adding 82 for the fourth wicket stand before Sharmin left the field injured for a resolute 64 in the 36th innings segment.

It was in favor of Bangladesh approaching the last two overs, with merely 12 runs needed.

Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and gave away merely three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida, skipper Joty and Marufa all dismissed as the Lankan team grabbed the victory at the very end.

Ultimately, it was a match of composure. The seasoned Lankan captain, who directed away a several of team-mates as she got ready to deliver the last over, kept her nerve. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be many doubts about the team's batting performance. They could easily have been pursuing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka appearing at ease on 159-4 in the 30th bowling phase, but in contrast the required total was much lower.

However, the batting side lacked purpose from the start, accumulating runs at below 2.5 scoring rate during the opening overs, experiencing a early batting collapse, and finally making themselves overwhelming to achieve.

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

It took them three efforts to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana not managing to grab a challenging chance as wicketkeeper to remove Hasini Perera on 23 before Athapaththu survived from a return catch chance against Rabeya.

Perera was spilled further on 55 and 63 runs, the latter chance going directly to Jhilik at cover position, before finally being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna as she attempted to increase the tempo with batting partners being dismissed near her.

Later in the innings, there was additionally a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, even though the latter was a little unfortunate, with Jhilik standing in with the wicketkeeping gloves following an fitness issue to Joty.

Unfortunately for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are not at all a single occurrence. They've failed to catch 14 catches from a available 27 chances at this competition and have the poorest fielding effectiveness (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a team who are generally progressing in the correct path – they are playing in only their second one-day World Cup ultimately – but poor fielding standards is a obvious problem which demands attention.