The Lankan team beats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their campaign alive
The Lankan team will face Pakistan in their decisive final tournament game
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): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42
Sri Lanka win by seven runs
Sri Lanka claimed four wickets in the decisive innings segment to achieve a nail-biting victory over Bangladesh and maintain their narrow hopes of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.
Chasing a modest total of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh required nine additional runs from the remaining six deliveries.
However, Lankan skipper Athapaththu claimed three important dismissals in four deliveries and de Silva ran out Nahida Akter to secure a thrilling win for Sri Lanka.
The win – the Lankan team's maiden of the tournament after three unsuccessful matches and two washed-out matches against Australia and New Zealand – pushes them equal on four points with the Indian team and the New Zealand side, who face each other on Thursday.
The Bangladeshi team, in contrast, suffered a fifth consecutive loss since securing victory in their tournament opener against Pakistan and have been eliminated.
Although Bangladesh made the ideal beginning, with Marufa striking with the opening bowl of the match to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were rightfully made to pay for a subpar fielding display.
They offered reprieves to Perera, who was spilled three times, and the Lankan captain.
Even though the Sri Lankan skipper was unable to capitalise, dismissed lbw for 46 one ball after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Perera made Bangladesh regret it.
She scored a debut international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 deliveries and contributing to an important 74-run partnership fifth-wicket with Nilakshi de Silva.
Bangladesh, led by Shorna Akter's 3-27, pulled themselves back into the contest, with De Silva's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment causing a Lankan batting collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 all out.
During their chase, Sri Lanka's initial pace attack Madara and Prabodhani limited Bangladesh to 23-1 in a lacklustre initial phase and they were afterwards brought down to 44 for three.
Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their batting effort, contributing 82 runs for the fourth wicket stand before the batter left the field injured for a determined 64 in the 36th bowling phase.
It was in favor of the chasing team approaching the last two innings segments, with only 12 runs required.
Yet, Dasanayaka sent back Ritu Moni and allowed merely three scoring runs before Athapaththu's dramatic spell, with Rabeya, Nahida, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as the Lankan team grabbed the triumph at the very end.
Bangladesh cannot hold nerve - and fielding opportunities
Finally, it was a match of nerves. The highly experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a handful of fellow players as she prepared to deliver the decisive over, kept her nerve. Bangladesh could not.
There will be numerous questions about the team's batting display. They possibly have been needing 270 to 280 with the Lankan team seeming settled on 159 for four in the 30th over, but rather the target was significantly less.
However, Bangladesh showed little purpose from ball one, scoring at below 2.5 runs each over during the initial phase, suffering a initial wicket loss, and ultimately leaving themselves too much to accomplish.
But no matter what problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had seized their opportunities in the fielding department, that 203-run goal would have been significantly less.
It took them three tries to end the 72-run partnership second-wicket association, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana not managing to grab a challenging opportunity as wicketkeeper to send back Perera on 23 before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a caught and bowled chance against Rabeya.
The batter was spilled once more on 55 and 63 runs, the final opportunity going right to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before ultimately being given out leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to increase the tempo with teammates being dismissed around her.
Later in the game, there was also a missed stumping and a missed run-out, while the run-out chance was a slightly regrettable, with Rubya Haider standing in with the keeping duties after an injury to Joty.
Sadly for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are not at all a single occurrence. They've missed 14 catches from a potential 27 opportunities at this tournament and have the worst catching success rate (48.1%) of the competing sides.
They are a side who are generally moving in the proper way – they are playing in just their second one-day World Cup in the end – but inadequate fielding is a glaring concern which requires improvement.
