Sri Lanka overcomes the Bangladeshi side to preserve their World Cup campaign ongoing

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side win by seven runs

The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the final innings segment to seal a thrilling victory over their opponents and maintain their narrow aspirations of making it for the tournament knockout stage ongoing.

Chasing a attainable total of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine runs from the remaining six bowls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three wickets in four bowls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to achieve a exciting victory for Sri Lanka.

The win – the Lankan team's maiden of the competition after three defeats and two washed-out matches against Australia and the Kiwi side – pushes them level on four points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, suffered a fifth successive loss since securing victory in their first match against the Pakistani team and have been removed from contention.

While Bangladesh got off to the excellent commencement, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the first delivery of the game to dismiss Vishmi Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a disappointing fielding display.

They offered lifelines to Hasini Perera, who was dropped on three occasions, and the Lankan captain.

Although Athapaththu was unable to take advantage, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 a single bowl after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera forced the opposition regret it.

She registered a first international fifty, making 85 from 99 deliveries and sharing an significant 74-run stand fifth-wicket association with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, guided by Shorna Akter's 3-27, pulled themselves back to the match, with Nilakshi's wicket in the 34th bowling segment causing a Lankan downfall from 174-4 to 202 total.

In reply, the Lankan team's starting bowlers Madara and Prabodhani contained Bangladesh to 23 for one in a uninspiring initial phase and they were afterwards diminished to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their innings, contributing 82 for the fourth wicket collaboration before the batter left the field injured for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.

It was in favor of the chasing team heading into the remaining two bowling phases, with merely 12 more runs needed.

Nevertheless, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and gave away merely three runs before the captain's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as Sri Lanka grabbed the victory at the final moment.

Ultimately, it was a game of nerves. The very experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a several of fellow players as she set herself to bowl the final over, maintained hers. The opposition could not.

There will be numerous doubts about the team's batting effort. They might well have been pursuing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka appearing at ease on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the required total was considerably smaller.

Yet, the batting side showed little aggression from ball one, making runs at less than 2.5 scoring rate during the opening overs, suffering a top-order collapse, and finally forcing themselves excessive to achieve.

But no matter what problems there are with their batting, if they had accepted their opportunities in the field, that 203-run objective would have been considerably smaller.

It needed them three efforts to terminate the 72-run second-wicket, with keeper Joty not managing to hold a tough catch as wicketkeeper to send back Hasini Perera on 23 runs before the captain was spared from a caught and bowled possibility against Rabeya.

Perera was dropped again on her score of 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity traveling right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before eventually being given out leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she attempted to increase the tempo with partners falling around her.

Subsequently in the batting effort, there was also a failed stumping and a run-out opportunity lost, while the second one was a somewhat regrettable, with Rubya Haider deputising with the wicketkeeping gloves following an fitness issue to Joty.

Sadly for the team, such fielding woes are far from a isolated incident. They've dropped 14 chances from a potential 27 at this World Cup and have the lowest catch efficiency (48.1 percent) of the competing sides.

They are a side who are overall moving in the right direction – they are playing in merely their second one-day World Cup in the end – but substandard fielding performance is a glaring issue which requires improvement.