Sri Lanka defeats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their tournament hopes alive

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side win by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the decisive over to seal a thrilling win over Bangladesh and maintain their faint chances of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Pursuing a attainable score of 203 on a good batting surface in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine additional runs from the final six balls.

Nevertheless, Lankan skipper Chamari Athapaththu secured three crucial wickets in four deliveries and de Silva ran out Nahida to achieve a thrilling win for the Lankan team.

The triumph – Sri Lanka's maiden of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against Australia and the Kiwi side – moves them tied on four points with India and the New Zealand side, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, experienced a fifth consecutive setback since securing victory in their initial game against Pakistan and have been eliminated.

Although Bangladesh made the perfect start, with Marufa striking with the initial ball of the match to send back Vishmi Gunaratne, they were deservedly punished for a disappointing fielding effort.

They provided lifelines to Perera, who was spilled multiple times, and Athapaththu.

While the Sri Lankan skipper could not capitalise, removed leg before wicket for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya, Perera made the opposition regret it.

She achieved a debut international 50-run score, scoring 85 from 99 bowls and building an important 74-run fifth-wicket with Nilakshi de Silva.

Bangladesh, guided by Shorna's three wickets for 27 runs, pulled themselves back to the contest, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment causing a Sri Lanka collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 complete.

During their chase, Sri Lanka's starting bowlers Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani restricted Bangladesh to 23 with one wicket down in a disappointing opening overs and they were afterwards reduced to 44-3.

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

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

Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and gave away just three runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa all removed as the Lankan team seized the triumph at the final moment.

Finally, it was a match of nerve. The very experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a handful of teammates as she got ready to deliver the decisive over, maintained hers. Bangladesh could not.

There will be many inquiries about Bangladesh's batting performance. They possibly have been chasing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka looking comfortable on 159 for four in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the required total was significantly less.

However, the batting side displayed insufficient aggression from ball one, making runs at under 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, experiencing a initial wicket loss, and eventually making themselves overwhelming to accomplish.

But whatever difficulties there are with their batting, if they had taken their catches in the fielding department, that 203-run target would have been significantly lower.

It required them three attempts to end the 72-run partnership second-wicket association, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana being unable to take a tough opportunity behind the stumps to dismiss Hasini Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was missed again on her score of 55 and 63 runs, the final opportunity flying directly to Jhilik at cover position, before eventually being trapped leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to increase the tempo with partners falling beside her.

Subsequently in the innings, there was additionally a stumping chance missed and a run-out opportunity lost, although the run-out chance was a little unlucky, with Rubya Haider substituting with the keeping duties following an fitness issue to the regular keeper.

Regrettably for Bangladesh, such fielding problems are not at all a one-off. They've missed 14 catches from a available 27 chances at this World Cup and boast the lowest catching success rate (less than 50%) of the eight teams.

They are a squad who are generally heading in the proper way – they are playing in only their second one-day World Cup after all – but poor fielding standards is a obvious concern which requires improvement.