The Lankan team defeats Bangladesh to preserve their tournament hopes 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

The Lankan cricket team secured four crucial dismissals in the decisive over to achieve a thrilling victory over their opponents and maintain their faint chances of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Needing a attainable target of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine more runs from the last six bowls.

However, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three crucial wickets in four bowls and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida to secure a thrilling victory for the Lankan team.

The victory – the Lankan team's maiden of the competition after three losses and two abandoned games against Australia and the Kiwi side – elevates them tied on four tournament points with India and New Zealand, who confront each other on the coming Thursday.

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

While the Bangladeshi side made the perfect start, with Marufa taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the match to dismiss Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a subpar fielding effort.

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

While Athapaththu was unable to capitalise, sent back leg before wicket for 46 a single bowl after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She achieved a debut international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 deliveries and contributing to an important 74-run fifth-wicket with De Silva.

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

In reply, the Lankan team's initial pace attack Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23 with one wicket down in a uninspiring initial phase and they were subsequently diminished to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Joty reconstructed their batting effort, contributing an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket collaboration before the batter left the field injured for a determined 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was in favor of the chasing team approaching the final two bowling phases, with just 12 runs needed.

Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and gave away merely three scoring runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all sent back as Sri Lanka seized the triumph at the very end.

Finally, it was a game of nerves. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who directed away a handful of teammates as she prepared to bowl the last over, kept her composure. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be numerous inquiries about the team's batting effort. They might well have been pursuing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka appearing settled on 159 for four in the 30th over, but in contrast the target was much lower.

Yet, the batting side displayed insufficient aggression from the very beginning, scoring at less than 2.5 scoring rate during the powerplay, undergoing a top-order collapse, and finally forcing themselves overwhelming to achieve.

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

It required them three efforts to end the 72-run stand second-wicket association, with wicketkeeper Joty being unable to hold a tough chance behind the stumps to dismiss Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu survived from a return catch opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

Perera was spilled further on 55 runs and her score of 63, the final opportunity traveling directly to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before eventually being trapped lbw by Shorna as she tried to increase the tempo with batting partners getting out near her.

Later in the batting effort, there was additionally a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, while the latter was a little unlucky, with Rubya Haider substituting with the keeping duties following an injury to Joty.

Sadly for Bangladesh, such fielding problems are far from a one-off. They've dropped 14 catches from a potential 27 chances at this competition and display the lowest fielding effectiveness (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a squad who are overall progressing in the proper way – they are participating in just their second ODI World Cup after all – but poor fielding performance is a glaring issue which needs attention.