The Lankan team overcomes the Bangladeshi side to keep their campaign alive

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

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

Sri Lanka win by seven runs

The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the decisive over to achieve a thrilling triumph over Bangladesh and preserve their slim aspirations of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Pursuing a attainable score of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh required nine runs from the final six bowls.

Nevertheless, Sri Lanka captain Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four balls and de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to secure a dramatic victory for the Lankan team.

The triumph – the Lankan team's maiden of the World Cup after three defeats and two abandoned games against Australia and the Kiwi side – elevates them tied on four tournament points with India and New Zealand, who face each other on the coming Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, on the other hand, endured a fifth successive setback since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

Even though Bangladesh got off to the perfect start, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the first delivery of the match to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were appropriately penalized for a disappointing fielding performance.

They offered second chances to Hasini Perera, who was dropped multiple times, and the Lankan captain.

While the Sri Lankan skipper was unable to capitalise, dismissed lbw for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya, Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She achieved a maiden international 50-run score, scoring 85 from 99 deliveries and building an important 74-run partnership fifth-wicket association with De Silva.

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna's 3-27, dragged themselves back in the contest, with De Silva's removal in the 34th over causing a Sri Lanka collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 all out.

During their chase, the Lankan team's starting bowlers Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani contained Bangladesh to 23 with one wicket down in a lacklustre initial phase and they were later reduced to 44-3.

Sharmin and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their score, putting on 82 runs for the fourth wicket before the batter retired hurt for a stubborn 64 in the 36th over.

It was leaning toward the chasing team heading into the final two innings segments, with only 12 runs needed.

However, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and allowed only three scoring runs before the captain's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all removed as Sri Lanka snatched the victory at the death.

Ultimately, it was a contest of composure. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a handful of teammates as she set herself to bowl the final over, held hers. Bangladesh could not.

There will be numerous questions about the team's batting performance. They possibly have been pursuing around 270-280 with the Lankan team seeming at ease on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but rather the target was much lower.

However, the batting side lacked intent from the very beginning, making runs at less than 2.5 scoring rate during the opening overs, undergoing a initial wicket loss, and eventually making themselves too much to achieve.

But whatever difficulties there are with their batting, if they had seized their catches in the fielding area, that 203 total goal would have been considerably smaller.

It required them three attempts to terminate the 72-run second-wicket collaboration, with keeper Nigar Sultana failing to grab a tough catch behind the stumps to remove Perera on 23 runs before the captain got a reprieve from a caught and bowled chance opportunity against Rabeya.

Perera was spilled once more on 55 and 63, the latter chance traveling straight to Jhilik at cover field, before eventually being given out leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she sought to accelerate the scoring with partners getting out around her.

Later in the batting effort, there was furthermore a missed stumping and a missed run-out, while the latter was a somewhat unlucky, with Jhilik substituting with the keeping duties following an injury to the regular keeper.

Regrettably for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are far from a isolated incident. They've dropped 14 chances from a potential 27 opportunities at this World Cup and have the worst fielding effectiveness (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a team who are overall progressing in the correct path – they are playing in just their second 50-over World Cup in the end – but inadequate fielding performance is a prominent concern which demands focus.