The Lankan team defeats Bangladesh to preserve their World Cup campaign ongoing

ICC Women's World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs margin

Sri Lanka secured four wickets in the decisive over to achieve a thrilling victory over their opponents and keep their slim aspirations of making it for the tournament knockout stage intact.

Needing a modest target of 203 on a favorable wicket in Navi Mumbai, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine runs from the final six bowls.

Yet, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four deliveries and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida to achieve a dramatic win for Sri Lanka.

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

Bangladesh, in contrast, endured a fifth straight loss since securing victory in their first match against Pakistan and have been removed from contention.

Although Bangladesh made the excellent commencement, with Marufa taking a wicket with the first delivery of the match to remove Gunaratne, they were rightfully punished for a subpar fielding performance.

They provided reprieves to Perera, who was spilled three times, and Athapaththu.

Although Athapaththu could not make it count, dismissed lbw for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera made Bangladesh suffer.

She scored a maiden international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 balls and contributing to an significant 74-run stand fifth-wicket collaboration with Nilakshi de Silva.

Bangladesh, guided by Shorna Akter's impressive bowling figures, fought themselves back into the match, with De Silva's removal in the 34th innings segment causing a Sri Lanka batting collapse from 174 for four to 202 all out.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's initial pace attack Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani contained the opposition to 23-1 in a lacklustre initial phase and they were subsequently diminished to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin and Joty restored their score, adding 82 for the fourth wicket before the batter left the field injured for a resolute 64 in the 36th innings segment.

It was leaning toward Bangladesh approaching the last two innings segments, with merely 12 more runs necessary.

Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka removed Ritu and conceded just three scoring runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as Sri Lanka snatched the win at the very end.

Ultimately, it was a game of composure. The seasoned Athapaththu, who moved aside a few of team-mates as she prepared to bowl the last over, maintained her nerve. Bangladesh did not.

There will be plenty of inquiries about the team's batting performance. They possibly have been pursuing around 270-280 with the Lankan team looking settled on 159-4 in the 30th innings segment, but instead the chase was much lower.

Nevertheless, Bangladesh showed little intent from the start, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs per over during the opening overs, experiencing a top-order collapse, and ultimately leaving themselves too much to achieve.

But no matter what difficulties there are with their batting, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding area, that 203-run target target would have been significantly less.

It needed them three attempts to end the 72-run stand second-wicket association, with keeper Joty being unable to hold a challenging chance while keeping to send back Hasini Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu was spared from a return catch possibility against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was dropped once more on 55 runs and her score of 63, the latter chance flying right to Jhilik at cover, before ultimately being given out leg before wicket by Shorna as she attempted to up the ante with teammates falling around her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was furthermore a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, even though the second one was a somewhat unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the keeping duties due to an injury to the regular keeper.

Sadly for Bangladesh, such fielding woes are not at all a isolated incident. They've missed 14 chances from a available 27 opportunities at this competition and display the lowest fielding effectiveness (48.1 percent) of the competing sides.

They are a side who are overall moving in the correct path – they are playing in only their second one-day World Cup after all – but poor fielding is a glaring issue which demands improvement.