The Lankan team overcomes Bangladesh to maintain their World Cup campaign breathing
The Lankan team will confront the Pakistani side in their must-win final group game
Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai
The Lankan team 202 (48.4 overs): Hasini Perera 85 (99); Shorna 3-27
Bangladesh 195-9 (50 overs): Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42
Sri Lanka win by seven runs margin
Sri Lanka secured four wickets in the last innings segment to seal a thrilling victory over their opponents and maintain their narrow chances of making it for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.
Chasing a modest target of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh needed nine runs from the final six deliveries.
However, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu claimed three wickets in four deliveries and de Silva ran out Nahida to achieve a exciting win for Sri Lanka.
The triumph – the Lankan team's first of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against the Australian team and New Zealand – elevates them tied on four points with the Indian team and the New Zealand side, who meet each other on Thursday.
The Bangladeshi team, in contrast, endured a fifth successive loss since winning their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.
Even though Bangladesh made the perfect start, with Marufa Akter taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the match to send back Gunaratne, they were rightfully punished for a disappointing fielding performance.
They provided lifelines to Perera, who was spilled three times, and Athapaththu.
Although the Sri Lankan skipper could not capitalise, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya, Perera made the opposition pay.
She registered a maiden international half-century, making 85 from 99 bowls and contributing to an crucial 74-run fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.
The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's 3-27, dragged themselves back to the game, with De Silva's wicket in the 34th innings segment causing a Lankan batting collapse from 174 for four to 202 complete.
During their chase, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Madara and Prabodhani limited Bangladesh to 23 for one in a lacklustre opening overs and they were later diminished to 44-3.
Sharmin and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their batting effort, putting on an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket collaboration before the batter withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.
It was leaning toward the chasing team entering the last two bowling phases, with only 12 runs necessary.
Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu and gave away just three scoring runs before Athapaththu's chaos, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all removed as the Lankan team grabbed the win at the death.
Bangladesh cannot hold nerve - and fielding opportunities
Ultimately, it was a match of composure. The highly experienced Athapaththu, who moved aside a several of team-mates as she got ready to bowl the decisive over, held her composure. Bangladesh could not.
There will be many questions about the team's batting effort. They possibly have been pursuing around 270-280 with Sri Lanka appearing settled on 159-4 in the 30th bowling phase, but instead the chase was considerably smaller.
Yet, Bangladesh lacked intent from the start, accumulating runs at less than 2.5 runs per over during the powerplay, undergoing a top-order collapse, and ultimately leaving themselves too much to do.
But whatever issues there are with their batting approach, if they had seized their catches in the fielding area, that 203-run objective would have been significantly smaller.
It needed them three tries to terminate the 72-run partnership second-wicket collaboration, with keeper Joty failing to grab a difficult catch behind the stumps to dismiss Hasini Perera on 23 before Athapaththu survived from a caught and bowled chance against Rabeya.
The batter was spilled again on her score of 55 and 63 runs, the final opportunity going straight to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover field, before eventually being trapped leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she attempted to increase the tempo with teammates falling near her.
Subsequently in the innings, there was additionally a failed stumping and a missed run-out, even though the latter was a slightly unfortunate, with Jhilik substituting with the wicketkeeping gloves following an physical problem to the regular keeper.
Sadly for Bangladesh, such fielding woes are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've dropped 14 opportunities from a available 27 opportunities at this competition and display the lowest catching success rate (48.1%) of the competing sides.
They are a team who are typically progressing in the correct path – they are participating in only their second ODI World Cup ultimately – but poor fielding performance is a prominent concern which demands attention.
