Sri Lanka overcomes the Bangladeshi side to preserve their World Cup campaign breathing

Women's Cricket World Cup, Mumbai

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

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

The Lankan side emerge victorious by seven runs

The Lankan cricket team took four wickets in the last innings segment to achieve a thrilling victory over Bangladesh and preserve their faint hopes of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Needing a below-par target of 203 on a good batting surface in Navi Mumbai, Bangladesh needed nine more runs from the remaining six balls.

Nevertheless, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three important dismissals in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva ran out Nahida to achieve a thrilling victory for Sri Lanka.

The win – Sri Lanka's initial of the competition after three losses and two no-results against Australia and the Kiwi side – pushes them equal on four match points with India and the New Zealand side, who confront each other on Thursday.

Bangladesh, in contrast, suffered a fifth successive loss since winning their initial game against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.

Even though Bangladesh got off to the ideal beginning, with Marufa Akter striking with the opening bowl of the game to remove Gunaratne, they were rightfully penalized for a subpar fielding effort.

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

Although Athapaththu could not make it count, sent back lbw for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced the opposition suffer.

She scored a debut international 50-run score, scoring 85 from 99 bowls and sharing an crucial 74-run fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, guided by Shorna's 3-27, dragged themselves back into the game, with De Silva's dismissal in the 34th over causing a Sri Lanka batting collapse from 174 for four to 202 all out.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's starting bowlers Madara and Prabodhani contained the opposition to 23 for one in a uninspiring opening overs and they were later diminished to 44 for three.

Sharmin and Joty rebuilt their score, adding an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket stand before the batter withdrew due to injury for a stubborn 64 in the 36th over.

It was advantage the chasing team heading into the remaining two bowling phases, with merely 12 runs necessary.

Yet, Dasanayaka removed Ritu and gave away just three runs before the captain's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all removed as Sri Lanka snatched the win at the final moment.

Ultimately, it was a game of nerves. The very experienced Lankan captain, who moved aside a several of team-mates as she set herself to deliver the decisive over, kept her composure. Bangladesh could not.

There will be plenty of questions about Bangladesh's batting display. They might well have been chasing around 270-280 with the Lankan team appearing at ease on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the chase was much lower.

However, Bangladesh displayed insufficient aggression from ball one, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs per over during the opening overs, experiencing a early batting collapse, and ultimately leaving themselves too much to achieve.

But no matter what problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had accepted their chances in the fielding area, that 203 total goal would have been substantially smaller.

It required them three tries to break the 72-run partnership second-wicket association, with keeper Joty failing to grab a tough opportunity as wicketkeeper to remove Perera on 23 before Athapaththu survived from a return catch opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

The batter was missed again on 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity traveling right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover position, before ultimately being trapped leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to accelerate the scoring with partners falling around her.

Afterwards in the innings, there was furthermore a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, even though the latter was a slightly unfortunate, with Rubya Haider deputising with the wicketkeeping gloves after an physical problem to Joty.

Regrettably for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are far from a isolated incident. They've missed 14 chances from a possible 27 at this World Cup and display the poorest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the participating teams.

They are a squad who are generally moving in the correct path – they are playing in merely their second 50-over World Cup in the end – but substandard fielding standards is a glaring issue which demands attention.