Sri Lanka overcomes the Bangladeshi side to maintain their campaign breathing

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

The Bangladeshi team 195-9 (50 overs): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs margin

Sri Lanka took four wickets in the last over to achieve a heart-stopping win over their opponents and keep their slim chances of making it for the World Cup semi-finals alive.

Needing a attainable target of 203 on a favorable wicket in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team needed nine additional runs from the remaining six deliveries.

However, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu took three crucial wickets in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to achieve a exciting victory for Sri Lanka.

The win – Sri Lanka's maiden of the competition after three losses and two washed-out matches against Australia and New Zealand – elevates them tied on four tournament points with India and New Zealand, who confront each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, endured a fifth straight setback since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been knocked out.

While Bangladesh made the ideal beginning, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the first delivery of the encounter to remove Gunaratne, they were appropriately punished for a disappointing fielding performance.

They gifted lifelines to Perera, who was spilled three times, and the Lankan captain.

Although the Sri Lankan skipper failed to make it count, removed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She scored a first international 50-run score, scoring 85 from 99 bowls and sharing an significant 74-run partnership fifth-wicket collaboration with Nilakshi de Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, guided by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, pulled themselves back in the game, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment triggering a Sri Lanka downfall from 174-4 to 202 total.

During their chase, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Madara and Prabodhani restricted the opposition to 23-1 in a uninspiring powerplay and they were subsequently diminished to 44-3.

Sharmin and Joty rebuilt their batting effort, contributing 82 runs for the fourth wicket before the batter retired hurt for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.

It was leaning toward the chasing team heading into the remaining two bowling phases, with merely 12 additional runs required.

Nevertheless, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and gave away just three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all removed as the Lankan team snatched the victory at the very end.

In the end, it was a contest of composure. The highly experienced Athapaththu, who directed away a handful of team-mates as she prepared to deliver the last over, kept her nerve. The opposition failed to.

There will be plenty of inquiries about Bangladesh's batting effort. They possibly have been needing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka appearing comfortable on 159-4 in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the required total was considerably smaller.

However, the batting side showed little intent from the very beginning, accumulating runs at below 2.5 runs per over during the opening overs, experiencing a initial wicket loss, and ultimately making themselves too much to accomplish.

But whatever issues there are with their batting, if they had accepted their catches in the fielding department, that 203-run goal would have been substantially lower.

It took them three attempts to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket, with wicketkeeper Joty not managing to take a challenging opportunity behind the stumps to send back Perera on her score of 23 before the captain got a reprieve from a caught and bowled chance against Rabeya.

The batter was spilled again on 55 and her score of 63, the last attempt flying straight to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover field, before ultimately being trapped lbw by Shorna as she tried to increase the tempo with partners being dismissed near her.

Later in the batting effort, there was furthermore a missed stumping and a failed run-out, even though the latter was a little regrettable, with Jhilik standing in with the keeping duties after an physical problem to Joty.

Regrettably for the team, such fielding woes are far from a isolated incident. They've dropped 14 catches from a potential 27 chances at this World Cup and have the worst catching success rate (48.1%) of the participating teams.

They are a team who are typically heading in the correct path – they are competing in merely their second one-day World Cup after all – but inadequate fielding is a prominent concern which needs attention.