The Lankan team defeats the Bangladeshi side to preserve their World Cup campaign ongoing

Women's Cricket World Cup, Navi Mumbai

Sri Lanka 202 (48.4 overs): Perera 85 (99); Shorna Akter 3-27

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

Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs

The Lankan cricket team claimed four wickets in the last innings segment to achieve a thrilling victory over Bangladesh and preserve their slim aspirations of making it for the tournament knockout stage alive.

Pursuing a below-par target of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine additional runs from the last six balls.

However, Lankan skipper Chamari Athapaththu secured three important dismissals in four balls and de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to achieve a exciting success for the Lankan team.

The victory – Sri Lanka's initial of the tournament after three defeats and two abandoned games against the Australian team and New Zealand – moves them level on four points with India and the New Zealand side, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.

The Bangladeshi team, however, endured a fifth straight setback since winning their initial game against Pakistan and have been knocked out.

Even though the Bangladeshi side got off to the ideal beginning, with Marufa taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the encounter to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were deservedly penalized for a subpar fielding performance.

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

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

She registered a debut international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 balls and sharing an important 74-run stand fifth-wicket association with Nilakshi de Silva.

Bangladesh, spearheaded by Shorna's three wickets for 27 runs, pulled themselves back into the match, with De Silva's dismissal in the 34th bowling segment triggering a Sri Lanka collapse from 174-4 to 202 all out.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's starting bowlers Madara and Prabodhani restricted the opposition to 23 with one wicket down in a uninspiring powerplay and they were afterwards reduced to 44-3.

Sharmin and Joty restored their innings, putting on an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket collaboration before Sharmin retired hurt for a stubborn 64 in the 36th bowling phase.

It was advantage Bangladesh entering the last two bowling phases, with just 12 additional runs required.

However, Dasanayaka dismissed Ritu and conceded just three runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa Akter all removed as Sri Lanka grabbed the win at the very end.

Ultimately, it was a game of nerve. The very experienced Athapaththu, who moved aside a several of team-mates as she got ready to bowl the decisive over, kept her nerve. Bangladesh failed to.

There will be many doubts about the team's batting display. They possibly have been pursuing around 270-280 with the Lankan team looking settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th bowling phase, but instead the chase was significantly less.

However, Bangladesh showed little purpose from the start, making runs at under 2.5 runs per over during the initial phase, undergoing a early batting collapse, and eventually forcing themselves too much to accomplish.

But no matter what problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had accepted their catches in the fielding area, that 203-run target goal would have been considerably less.

It needed them three attempts to break the 72-run stand second-wicket association, with wicketkeeper Joty not managing to hold a challenging chance as wicketkeeper to send back Perera on 23 runs before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya Khan.

Perera was missed again on 55 and her score of 63, the final opportunity going directly to Jhilik at cover position, before eventually being given out leg before wicket by Shorna as she sought to up the ante with partners falling near her.

Later in the batting effort, there was also a missed stumping and a missed run-out, although the second one was a slightly unfortunate, with Rubya Haider standing in with the gloves due to an fitness issue to Joty.

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

They are a squad who are generally heading in the proper way – they are participating in only their second ODI World Cup after all – but substandard fielding performance is a prominent concern which demands attention.