Sri Lanka defeats the Bangladeshi side to preserve their World Cup tournament hopes alive

Women's Cricket World Cup, Mumbai

Sri Lanka 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

Sri Lanka took four wickets in the decisive over to seal a thrilling win over their opponents and preserve their slim aspirations of qualifying for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.

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

Yet, Lankan skipper Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to secure a thrilling win for Sri Lanka.

The win – Sri Lanka's initial of the competition after three defeats and two abandoned games against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – moves them tied on four match points with India and the New Zealand side, who face each other on Thursday.

Bangladesh, however, endured a fifth consecutive defeat since securing victory in their initial game against Pakistan and have been knocked out.

Although Bangladesh made the perfect start, with Marufa striking with the initial ball of the match to send back Gunaratne, they were appropriately penalized for a poor fielding effort.

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

Although Athapaththu was unable to make it count, removed lbw for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera made the opposition regret it.

She scored a debut international half-century, scoring 85 from 99 balls and building an crucial 74-run stand fifth-wicket with Nilakshi de Silva.

Bangladesh, guided by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, dragged themselves back into the contest, with Nilakshi's wicket in the 34th over initiating a Lankan downfall from 174-4 to 202 total.

During their chase, the Lankan team's initial pace attack Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani contained the opposition to 23 with one wicket down in a uninspiring initial phase and they were subsequently brought down to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their batting effort, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket collaboration before the batter withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.

It was advantage Bangladesh entering the last two innings segments, with just 12 additional runs necessary.

Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and allowed only three runs before the captain's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa all dismissed as the Lankan team grabbed the victory at the very end.

Finally, it was a game of nerves. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a few of fellow players as she set herself to deliver the final over, maintained her nerve. The opposition failed to.

There will be plenty of doubts about the team's batting effort. They might well have been pursuing 270 to 280 with the Lankan team seeming settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but instead the chase was significantly less.

However, the batting side showed little purpose from the start, accumulating runs at under 2.5 runs each over during the opening overs, experiencing a early batting collapse, and eventually forcing themselves too much to do.

But no matter what issues there are with their batting, if they had accepted their catches in the fielding area, that 203-run objective would have been substantially less.

It required them three tries to terminate the 72-run stand second-wicket, with keeper Nigar Sultana not managing to take a challenging catch behind the stumps to send back Hasini Perera on 23 before Athapaththu was spared from a caught and bowled chance chance against Rabeya Khan.

Perera was missed again on 55 runs and her score of 63, the last attempt flying straight to Jhilik at cover field, before ultimately being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she attempted to up the ante with batting partners getting out around her.

Subsequently in the batting effort, there was additionally a missed stumping and a failed run-out, although the second one was a slightly unlucky, with Jhilik substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves after an fitness issue to Joty.

Unfortunately for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are nowhere near a one-off. They've dropped 14 opportunities from a available 27 chances at this World Cup and boast the lowest catch efficiency (48.1%) of the competing sides.

They are a squad who are generally heading in the correct path – they are playing in just their second 50-over World Cup after all – but inadequate fielding standards is a obvious issue which demands attention.