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

ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka win by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team took four crucial dismissals in the last over to seal a nail-biting triumph over their opponents and preserve their narrow aspirations of making it for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.

Pursuing a attainable total of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh needed nine runs from the final six bowls.

However, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu claimed three wickets in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to bring about a exciting win for Sri Lanka.

The victory – Sri Lanka's first of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two no-results against Australia and the Kiwi side – pushes them equal on four tournament points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who meet each other on Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, on the other hand, suffered a fifth successive defeat since winning their first match against Pakistan and have been knocked out.

Although the Bangladeshi side got off to the excellent commencement, with Marufa Akter striking with the first delivery of the game to remove Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a disappointing fielding performance.

They offered lifelines to Perera, who was missed multiple times, and the Lankan captain.

Although the Sri Lankan skipper could not make it count, sent back leg before wicket for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera made Bangladesh regret it.

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

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna's impressive bowling figures, pulled themselves back into the game, with Nilakshi's removal in the 34th innings segment causing a Lankan downfall from 174 with four wickets down to 202 total.

During their chase, Sri Lanka's starting bowlers Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited Bangladesh to 23 for one in a lacklustre powerplay and they were later brought down to 44 for three.

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

It was advantage the chasing team heading into the remaining two overs, with only 12 additional runs necessary.

Nevertheless, Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu and allowed merely three runs before Athapaththu's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as Sri Lanka grabbed the triumph at the final moment.

In the end, it was a match of nerve. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a few of team-mates as she prepared to bowl the final over, kept her nerve. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be plenty of inquiries about Bangladesh's batting effort. They might well have been chasing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka appearing settled on 159 for four in the 30th over, but rather the chase was significantly less.

However, the batting side lacked intent from the very beginning, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs each over during the opening overs, undergoing a top-order collapse, and finally leaving themselves too much to accomplish.

But whatever issues there are with their batting approach, if they had taken their chances in the fielding area, that 203-run goal would have been significantly less.

It needed them three attempts to terminate the 72-run second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana failing to hold a tough opportunity while keeping to remove Hasini Perera on 23 runs before the captain was spared from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was missed once more on 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity flying directly to Jhilik at cover, before finally being given out lbw by Shorna as she sought to increase the tempo with batting partners getting out around her.

Subsequently in the innings, there was also a failed stumping and a missed run-out, although the latter was a somewhat unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves due to an physical problem to Joty.

Sadly for the team, such fielding woes are not at all a isolated incident. They've failed to catch 14 opportunities from a potential 27 at this tournament and display the lowest catch efficiency (48.1%) of the participating teams.

They are a squad who are typically moving in the proper way – they are playing in just their second one-day World Cup ultimately – but inadequate fielding is a glaring concern which requires improvement.