Sri Lanka overcomes the Bangladeshi side to maintain their World Cup tournament hopes ongoing

Women's Cricket World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs margin

The Lankan cricket team claimed four crucial dismissals in the last innings segment to complete a thrilling victory over their opponents and keep their slim hopes of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Chasing a below-par total of 203 on a favorable wicket in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh required nine more runs from the last six bowls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu claimed three wickets in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida to secure a dramatic victory for the Lankan team.

The victory – the Lankan team's first of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – pushes them equal on four tournament points with the Indian team and the New Zealand side, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, experienced a fifth consecutive setback since securing victory in their initial game against Pakistan and have been removed from contention.

Even though the Bangladeshi side made the perfect start, with Marufa striking with the first delivery of the game to send back Gunaratne, they were deservedly penalized for a poor fielding performance.

They offered lifelines to Perera, who was missed on three occasions, and Athapaththu.

While Athapaththu was unable to take advantage, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh suffer.

She registered a maiden international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 deliveries and building an important 74-run stand fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's 3-27, pulled themselves back into the contest, with De Silva's removal in the 34th innings segment triggering a Lankan collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 total.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Madara and Prabodhani contained the opposition to 23-1 in a disappointing powerplay and they were later reduced to 44 for three.

Sharmin Akter and Joty rebuilt their batting effort, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket before Sharmin withdrew due to injury for a determined 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was leaning toward the chasing team entering the remaining two innings segments, with just 12 runs required.

Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka removed Ritu Moni and gave away merely three runs before the captain's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as Sri Lanka snatched the triumph at the very end.

Ultimately, it was a game of composure. The very experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a few of team-mates as she set herself to bowl the final over, kept hers. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be many doubts about Bangladesh's batting performance. They could easily have been chasing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka seeming comfortable on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th over, but rather the chase was significantly less.

However, the batting side showed little intent from the start, scoring at less than 2.5 scoring rate during the initial phase, suffering a early batting collapse, and ultimately forcing themselves excessive to accomplish.

But whatever problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had accepted their chances in the fielding area, that 203-run target would have been significantly less.

It needed them three attempts to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket, with wicketkeeper Joty being unable to grab a difficult opportunity while keeping to dismiss Perera on 23 before Athapaththu survived from a caught and bowled possibility against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was spilled further on her score of 55 and 63, the final opportunity traveling straight to Jhilik at cover, before ultimately being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she tried to accelerate the scoring with partners being dismissed near her.

Later in the game, there was also a stumping chance missed and a failed run-out, even though the run-out chance was a little unfortunate, with Rubya Haider standing in with the wicketkeeping gloves after an injury to Joty.

Unfortunately for the team, such fielding problems are not at all a one-off. They've failed to catch 14 opportunities from a available 27 opportunities at this tournament and display the lowest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the eight teams.

They are a squad who are typically progressing in the correct path – they are competing in just their second 50-over World Cup ultimately – but substandard fielding is a glaring issue which needs attention.