Sri Lanka beats the Bangladeshi side to keep their World Cup tournament hopes alive

Women's Cricket 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 win by seven runs

Sri Lanka took four crucial dismissals in the final over to achieve a thrilling triumph over their opponents and keep their narrow chances of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals alive.

Chasing a attainable score of 203 on a favorable wicket in Navi Mumbai, Bangladesh required nine additional runs from the remaining six bowls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu secured three important dismissals in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to bring about a exciting win for Sri Lanka.

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

Bangladesh, in contrast, endured a fifth successive defeat since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

While Bangladesh made the excellent commencement, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the first delivery of the game to send back Vishmi Gunaratne, they were rightfully punished for a poor fielding performance.

They offered reprieves to Perera, who was dropped on three occasions, and the Lankan captain.

Although Athapaththu was unable to take advantage, removed lbw for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya, Perera forced the opposition pay.

She achieved a maiden international half-century, making 85 from 99 bowls and contributing to an crucial 74-run partnership fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna's 3-27, pulled themselves back in the match, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment causing a Sri Lanka downfall from 174 for four to 202 total.

During their chase, Sri Lanka's initial pace attack Madara and Prabodhani contained Bangladesh to 23 for one in a uninspiring powerplay and they were afterwards brought down to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their batting effort, adding 82 for the fourth wicket collaboration before the batter retired hurt for a determined 64 in the 36th over.

It was in favor of the chasing team heading into the final two bowling phases, with only 12 runs needed.

Nevertheless, Dasanayaka removed Ritu and conceded only three scoring runs before Athapaththu's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa all removed as the Lankan team snatched the victory at the death.

Finally, it was a game of composure. The seasoned Athapaththu, who ushered away a several of team-mates as she got ready to bowl the final over, maintained her nerve. The opposition did not.

There will be numerous questions about Bangladesh's batting effort. They could easily have been chasing 270 to 280 with the Lankan team seeming comfortable on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the required total was much lower.

Yet, the batting side lacked purpose from ball one, making runs at less than 2.5 runs each over during the opening overs, experiencing a early batting collapse, and finally forcing themselves excessive to achieve.

But no matter what problems there are with their batting, if they had seized their chances in the fielding area, that 203-run goal would have been substantially lower.

It needed them three efforts to break the 72-run stand second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Joty being unable to take a challenging catch behind the stumps to remove Hasini Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu was spared from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

Perera was dropped once more on her score of 55 and 63, the last attempt flying right to Jhilik at cover, before eventually being trapped leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she attempted to accelerate the scoring with partners being dismissed near her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was also a missed stumping and a run-out opportunity lost, while the second one was a somewhat unlucky, with Rubya Haider standing in with the gloves following an physical problem to Joty.

Unfortunately for the team, such fielding problems are not at all a single occurrence. They've missed 14 opportunities from a available 27 opportunities at this World Cup and have the lowest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a team who are typically moving in the proper way – they are participating in just their second one-day World Cup ultimately – but poor fielding is a prominent problem which requires focus.