Sri Lanka beats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their tournament hopes ongoing

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs margin

Sri Lanka took four crucial dismissals in the final over to seal a thrilling victory over Bangladesh and maintain their narrow aspirations of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals alive.

Needing a below-par score of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine additional runs from the remaining six bowls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four deliveries and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to secure a dramatic win for Sri Lanka.

The win – Sri Lanka's first of the competition after three losses and two no-results against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – pushes them level on four tournament points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who confront each other on Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, in contrast, suffered a fifth straight loss since winning their initial game against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

Although the Bangladeshi side got off to the ideal beginning, with Marufa taking a wicket with the first delivery of the encounter to dismiss Vishmi Gunaratne, they were deservedly made to pay for a disappointing fielding display.

They offered lifelines to Perera, who was dropped on three occasions, and Athapaththu.

While the Sri Lankan skipper could not capitalise, sent back leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya, Perera forced the opposition regret it.

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

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's 3-27, pulled themselves back in the game, with De Silva's removal in the 34th bowling segment triggering a Sri Lanka downfall from 174 with four wickets down to 202 complete.

While batting second, the Lankan team's initial pace attack Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani restricted Bangladesh to 23 with one wicket down in a uninspiring opening overs and they were later diminished to 44-3.

Sharmin Akter and Joty rebuilt their innings, adding 82 for the fourth wicket stand before the batter retired hurt for a resolute 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was in favor of the chasing team heading into the remaining two overs, with only 12 more runs necessary.

However, Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu and conceded merely three scoring runs before the captain's decisive intervention, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all removed as Sri Lanka seized the win at the death.

In the end, it was a match of nerves. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a handful of fellow players as she set herself to deliver the last over, kept her nerve. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be numerous doubts about the team's batting performance. They could easily have been chasing 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.

Nevertheless, the batting side displayed insufficient aggression from the very beginning, accumulating runs at below 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, experiencing a initial wicket loss, and ultimately leaving themselves too much to achieve.

But whatever difficulties there are with their batting lineup, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding area, that 203-run goal would have been significantly smaller.

It took them three efforts to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana failing to hold a challenging chance while keeping to dismiss Hasini Perera on 23 runs before the captain was spared from a caught and bowled chance possibility against Rabeya.

The batter was dropped again on 55 runs and her score of 63, the latter chance traveling straight to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover position, before eventually being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she sought to increase the tempo with partners being dismissed beside her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was additionally a failed stumping and a run-out opportunity lost, even though the run-out chance was a somewhat unfortunate, with Rubya Haider deputising with the wicketkeeping gloves following an injury to the regular keeper.

Regrettably for the team, such fielding problems are far from a one-off. They've failed to catch 14 opportunities from a possible 27 opportunities at this tournament and have the poorest fielding effectiveness (48.1%) of the competing sides.

They are a squad who are overall heading in the correct path – they are participating in only their second one-day World Cup after all – but substandard fielding performance is a obvious issue which requires focus.