The Lankan team overcomes the Bangladeshi side to maintain their tournament hopes ongoing

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

Sri Lanka 202 (48.4 overs): Hasini 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

Sri Lanka claimed four crucial dismissals in the last innings segment to achieve a nail-biting triumph over their opponents and preserve their narrow chances of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals intact.

Chasing a modest score of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team required nine runs from the remaining six deliveries.

However, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu claimed three crucial wickets in four deliveries and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida to bring about a exciting win for the Lankan team.

The victory – Sri Lanka's first of the tournament after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – pushes them equal on four tournament points with India and New Zealand, who meet each other on Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, however, suffered a fifth consecutive setback since securing victory in their initial game against Pakistan and have been removed from contention.

Although the Bangladeshi side made the ideal beginning, with Marufa Akter striking with the first delivery of the match to send back Vishmi Gunaratne, they were rightfully punished for a disappointing fielding performance.

They provided reprieves to Perera, who was spilled multiple times, and the Lankan captain.

Although Athapaththu could not make it count, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She scored a debut international half-century, scoring 85 from 99 deliveries and contributing to an important 74-run partnership fifth-wicket association with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's impressive bowling figures, pulled themselves back to the contest, with Nilakshi's wicket in the 34th over initiating a Sri Lanka collapse from 174-4 to 202 total.

While batting second, the Lankan team's initial pace attack Madara and Prabodhani restricted Bangladesh to 23 for one in a uninspiring powerplay and they were afterwards diminished to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their batting effort, contributing 82 runs for the fourth wicket collaboration before Sharmin withdrew due to injury for a determined 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was advantage Bangladesh heading into the final two bowling phases, with merely 12 more runs needed.

However, Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu Moni and conceded only three scoring runs before the captain's chaos, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all removed as the Lankan team snatched the win at the death.

Finally, it was a match of composure. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a few of teammates as she got ready to bowl the decisive over, maintained her nerve. Bangladesh could not.

There will be many doubts about the team's batting effort. They could easily have been pursuing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka seeming settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but rather the chase was much lower.

Yet, the batting side lacked intent from the very beginning, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, undergoing a top-order collapse, and ultimately leaving themselves excessive to achieve.

But whatever difficulties there are with their batting approach, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding department, that 203 total objective would have been considerably less.

It needed them three attempts to break the 72-run stand second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana being unable to hold a tough catch behind the stumps to remove Perera on 23 runs before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a return catch chance against Rabeya Khan.

Perera was dropped further on 55 and 63, the last attempt going right to Jhilik at cover field, before ultimately being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to accelerate the scoring with partners being dismissed near her.

Subsequently in the game, there was additionally a missed stumping and a missed run-out, although the second one was a slightly unlucky, with Jhilik standing in with the gloves following an physical problem to Joty.

Regrettably for the team, such fielding issues are far from a single occurrence. They've missed 14 opportunities from a possible 27 chances at this World Cup and display the lowest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the eight teams.

They are a side who are generally heading in the proper way – they are competing in merely their second 50-over World Cup in the end – but substandard fielding standards is a obvious concern which demands improvement.