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

ICC Women's World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka win by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team claimed four crucial dismissals in the last innings segment to seal a nail-biting victory over their opponents and maintain their slim hopes of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage ongoing.

Needing a modest score of 203 on a favorable wicket in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine additional runs from the last six deliveries.

Yet, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu took three crucial wickets in four bowls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to achieve a thrilling win for Sri Lanka.

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

The Bangladeshi team, on the other hand, experienced a fifth successive loss since winning their first match against Pakistan and have been removed from contention.

Even though Bangladesh got off to the perfect start, with Marufa taking a wicket with the first delivery of the match to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were deservedly penalized for a poor fielding effort.

They gifted reprieves to Perera, who was missed three times, and Athapaththu.

While Athapaththu failed to take advantage, sent back leg before wicket for 46 one ball after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera made Bangladesh suffer.

She registered a first international 50-run score, making 85 from 99 deliveries and contributing to an important 74-run fifth-wicket association with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, dragged themselves back to the contest, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment causing a Sri Lanka batting collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 all out.

During their chase, the Lankan team's initial pace attack Malki Madara and Prabodhani restricted the opposition to 23-1 in a lacklustre powerplay and they were afterwards reduced to 44-3.

Sharmin Akter and Joty restored their batting effort, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket before Sharmin left the field injured for a stubborn 64 in the 36th innings segment.

It was in favor of Bangladesh approaching the last two bowling phases, with just 12 more runs necessary.

However, Dasanayaka removed Ritu and gave away only three runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa all removed as Sri Lanka grabbed the victory at the death.

Finally, it was a contest of composure. The very experienced Athapaththu, who ushered away a few of teammates as she set herself to bowl the decisive over, kept hers. 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 the Lankan team seeming comfortable on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th over, but instead the required total was much lower.

However, Bangladesh showed little purpose from ball one, making runs at less than 2.5 runs per over during the initial phase, experiencing a early batting collapse, and finally making themselves overwhelming to accomplish.

But no matter what issues there are with their batting lineup, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding area, that 203 total objective would have been considerably smaller.

It took them three efforts to end the 72-run stand second-wicket, with keeper Joty not managing to grab a challenging opportunity behind the stumps to dismiss Perera on 23 runs before Athapaththu survived from a caught and bowled chance possibility against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was dropped further on 55 runs and 63, the last attempt flying straight to Jhilik at cover field, before eventually being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she sought to increase the tempo with partners getting out near her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was furthermore a failed stumping and a run-out opportunity lost, while the run-out chance was a little unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves following an physical problem to Joty.

Regrettably for the team, such fielding issues are far from a isolated incident. They've missed 14 catches from a possible 27 opportunities at this World Cup and boast the poorest fielding effectiveness (48.1%) of the eight teams.

They are a squad who are overall progressing in the proper way – they are participating in only their second 50-over World Cup after all – but poor fielding is a obvious concern which demands attention.