The Lankan team beats Bangladesh to maintain their World Cup tournament hopes breathing

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side win by seven runs

The Lankan cricket team took four crucial dismissals in the final innings segment to achieve a heart-stopping triumph over Bangladesh and keep their faint aspirations of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Chasing a attainable target of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh required nine more runs from the last six deliveries.

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

The triumph – Sri Lanka's initial of the tournament after three unsuccessful matches and two washed-out matches against Australia and the Kiwi side – elevates them equal on four match points with India and the New Zealand side, who face each other on Thursday.

Bangladesh, on the other hand, endured a fifth consecutive setback since securing victory in their first match against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

While the Bangladeshi side made the ideal beginning, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the encounter to send back Gunaratne, they were appropriately penalized for a disappointing fielding effort.

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

While the Sri Lankan skipper could not capitalise, sent back lbw for 46 one ball after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She achieved a first international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 bowls and building an significant 74-run fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna's 3-27, dragged themselves back into the match, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment triggering a Lankan collapse from 174-4 to 202 all out.

While batting second, the Lankan team's opening bowlers Malki Madara and Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23 with one wicket down in a lacklustre initial phase and they were afterwards reduced to 44-3.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty restored their batting effort, putting on 82 runs for the fourth wicket before Sharmin withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.

It was advantage Bangladesh entering the final two innings segments, with just 12 more runs necessary.

Yet, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and allowed just three scoring runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all removed as the Lankan team seized the victory at the very end.

Finally, it was a game of nerves. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who directed away a few of fellow players as she set herself to deliver the decisive over, held hers. Bangladesh did not.

There will be plenty of questions about Bangladesh's batting display. They could easily have been pursuing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka seeming comfortable on 159-4 in the 30th over, but instead the target was significantly less.

Nevertheless, Bangladesh lacked intent from the start, accumulating runs at under 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, experiencing a initial wicket loss, and finally forcing themselves excessive to achieve.

But whatever difficulties there are with their batting, if they had taken their chances in the field, that 203-run target would have been considerably lower.

It needed them three efforts to end the 72-run stand second-wicket association, with keeper Joty being unable to hold a tough chance behind the stumps to dismiss Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya.

The batter was dropped again on her score of 55 and 63 runs, the latter chance flying right to Jhilik at cover position, before ultimately being given out leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she tried to up the ante with teammates getting out near her.

Subsequently in the innings, there was furthermore a failed stumping and a missed run-out, although the run-out chance was a somewhat regrettable, with Rubya Haider deputising with the gloves due to an physical problem to the regular keeper.

Sadly for the team, such fielding problems are far from a isolated incident. They've failed to catch 14 chances from a potential 27 opportunities at this tournament and have the lowest catching success rate (48.1%) of the eight teams.

They are a team who are generally progressing in the correct path – they are competing in only their second ODI World Cup in the end – but inadequate fielding is a obvious concern which demands attention.