The Lankan team defeats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their World Cup campaign ongoing

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs margin

Sri Lanka took four crucial dismissals in the last innings segment to seal a heart-stopping win over their opponents and keep their faint chances of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.

Pursuing a modest score of 203 on a good batting surface in Navi Mumbai, Bangladesh needed nine additional runs from the final six balls.

Yet, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu claimed three wickets in four bowls and de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to bring about a dramatic win for Sri Lanka.

The triumph – the Lankan team's initial of the World Cup after three defeats and two no-results against Australia and New Zealand – pushes them tied on four match points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who face each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, suffered a fifth consecutive defeat since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been removed from contention.

Even though Bangladesh made the ideal beginning, with Marufa striking with the first delivery of the match to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were appropriately punished for a subpar fielding performance.

They offered second chances to Hasini Perera, who was dropped three times, and the Lankan captain.

While the Sri Lankan skipper failed to make it count, sent back leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera forced the opposition pay.

She achieved a maiden international fifty, accumulating 85 from 99 balls and sharing an crucial 74-run fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, pulled themselves back into the game, with De Silva's removal in the 34th bowling segment initiating a Lankan batting collapse from 174 for four to 202 all out.

In reply, the Lankan team's starting bowlers Malki Madara and Prabodhani restricted the opposition to 23-1 in a lacklustre initial phase and they were afterwards brought down to 44 for three.

Sharmin and Joty reconstructed their score, adding 82 runs for the fourth wicket before the batter withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th innings segment.

It was leaning toward Bangladesh approaching the final two overs, with just 12 more runs required.

Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu and allowed only three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, skipper Joty and Marufa all sent back as the Lankan team snatched the triumph at the death.

In the end, it was a contest of composure. The very experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a few of team-mates as she prepared to bowl the last over, maintained hers. The opposition could not.

There will be numerous doubts about the team's batting performance. They could easily have been needing around 270-280 with Sri Lanka looking settled on 159 for four in the 30th innings segment, but instead the required total was considerably smaller.

However, Bangladesh lacked aggression from the very beginning, accumulating runs at below 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, undergoing a early batting collapse, and ultimately making themselves excessive to accomplish.

But no matter what issues there are with their batting approach, if they had taken their catches in the fielding area, that 203 total target would have been substantially smaller.

It needed them three tries to terminate the 72-run second-wicket association, with keeper Nigar Sultana failing to grab a challenging opportunity behind the stumps to remove Hasini Perera on her score of 23 before the captain survived from a caught and bowled possibility against Rabeya.

Perera was spilled once more on 55 runs and 63 runs, the last attempt traveling right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover position, before eventually being trapped lbw by Shorna Akter as she attempted to accelerate the scoring with partners getting out beside her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was additionally a missed stumping and a missed run-out, although the second one was a little unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves due to an injury to Joty.

Sadly for the team, such fielding problems are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've failed to catch 14 opportunities from a available 27 at this competition and boast the poorest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a squad who are typically progressing in the right direction – they are participating in only their second 50-over World Cup after all – but substandard fielding is a obvious problem which requires improvement.