The Lankan team overcomes Bangladesh to preserve their tournament hopes alive

ICC Women's World Cup, Navi Mumbai

Sri Lanka 202 (48.4 overs): 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 margin

Sri Lanka secured four wickets in the decisive innings segment to seal a nail-biting triumph over their opponents and maintain their faint chances of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals alive.

Chasing a below-par total of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine more runs from the last six balls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four balls and de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to achieve a thrilling victory for Sri Lanka.

The win – the Lankan team's initial of the World Cup after three unsuccessful matches and two washed-out matches against Australia and New Zealand – pushes them level on four tournament points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, in contrast, endured a fifth consecutive defeat since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

Although the Bangladeshi side made the ideal beginning, with Marufa Akter striking with the first delivery of the encounter to dismiss Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a subpar fielding effort.

They provided second chances to Perera, who was spilled three times, and Athapaththu.

While the Sri Lankan skipper was unable to make it count, removed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Perera made the opposition suffer.

She registered a first international half-century, making 85 from 99 balls and contributing to an crucial 74-run stand fifth-wicket with De Silva.

Bangladesh, guided by Shorna's 3-27, fought themselves back into the game, with De Silva's wicket in the 34th bowling segment triggering a Sri Lanka collapse from 174-4 to 202 all out.

In reply, the Lankan team's opening bowlers Madara and Prabodhani restricted the opposition to 23 for one in a lacklustre powerplay and they were subsequently reduced to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their score, contributing an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket before Sharmin withdrew due to injury for a determined 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was in favor of Bangladesh heading into the final two innings segments, with merely 12 additional runs required.

Yet, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and gave away merely three scoring runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all sent back as the Lankan team seized the win at the final moment.

Finally, it was a game of nerve. The highly experienced Athapaththu, who directed away a several of team-mates as she got ready to bowl the decisive over, kept her composure. Bangladesh did not.

There will be plenty of doubts about the team's batting effort. They could easily have been chasing around 270-280 with Sri Lanka appearing settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the chase was much lower.

Yet, the batting side lacked aggression from the start, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs each over during the initial phase, experiencing a top-order collapse, and finally making themselves excessive to do.

But no matter what problems there are with their batting approach, if they had taken their opportunities in the field, that 203 total objective would have been significantly lower.

It needed them three attempts to break the 72-run stand second-wicket, with keeper Joty failing to take a challenging catch behind the stumps to send back Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu was spared from a return catch opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was missed once more on 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity traveling straight to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover position, before eventually being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna as she attempted to up the ante with batting partners being dismissed near her.

Subsequently in the innings, there was furthermore a missed stumping and a failed run-out, even though the latter was a somewhat unlucky, with Jhilik standing in with the gloves following an physical problem to Joty.

Regrettably for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've missed 14 chances from a potential 27 at this competition and have the poorest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the competing sides.

They are a side who are typically heading in the correct path – they are playing in only their second 50-over World Cup after all – but poor fielding is a glaring concern which requires improvement.