The Lankan team overcomes the Bangladeshi side to preserve their World Cup tournament hopes ongoing

ICC Women's World Cup, Navi Mumbai

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

The Bangladeshi team 195-9 (50 overs): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42

Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs

Sri Lanka took four wickets in the final innings segment to seal a nail-biting victory over their opponents and preserve their narrow chances of making it for the tournament knockout stage intact.

Needing a below-par score of 203 on a good batting surface in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team needed nine additional runs from the final six balls.

Yet, Lankan skipper Chamari Athapaththu took three crucial wickets in four bowls and de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida Akter to secure a exciting success for Sri Lanka.

The win – the Lankan team's first of the competition after three unsuccessful matches and two no-results against the Australian team and New Zealand – elevates them level on four match points with India and the New Zealand side, who face each other on the coming Thursday.

Bangladesh, however, suffered a fifth successive setback since securing victory in their initial game against Pakistan and have been knocked out.

While the Bangladeshi side made the perfect start, with Marufa striking with the initial ball of the match to send back Vishmi Gunaratne, they were appropriately made to pay for a subpar fielding performance.

They gifted second chances to Perera, who was spilled three times, and Athapaththu.

While Athapaththu was unable to make it count, sent back leg before wicket for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh regret it.

She achieved a first international half-century, scoring 85 from 99 deliveries and sharing an important 74-run fifth-wicket with De Silva.

The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna's 3-27, fought themselves back into the match, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th innings segment causing a Lankan collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 total.

While batting second, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani restricted Bangladesh to 23 with one wicket down in a uninspiring opening overs and they were afterwards reduced to 44 with three wickets lost.

Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their innings, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket before the batter left the field injured for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.

It was advantage the chasing team approaching the remaining two overs, with just 12 runs needed.

Yet, Dasanayaka removed Ritu and allowed merely three runs before Athapaththu's chaos, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all sent back as the Lankan team seized the win at the death.

Ultimately, it was a contest of nerves. The very experienced Lankan captain, who directed away a handful of teammates as she prepared to deliver the decisive over, kept her composure. The opposition did not.

There will be many inquiries about the team's batting effort. They could easily have been chasing 270 to 280 with Sri Lanka seeming settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th over, but instead the required total was significantly less.

Yet, Bangladesh showed little aggression from the very beginning, scoring at under 2.5 scoring rate during the initial phase, suffering a initial wicket loss, and eventually making themselves overwhelming to accomplish.

But whatever problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had accepted their opportunities in the field, that 203 total objective would have been substantially less.

It took them three tries to break the 72-run second-wicket, with keeper Nigar Sultana not managing to take a challenging catch as wicketkeeper to dismiss Hasini Perera on 23 before the captain survived from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya.

The batter was missed once more on 55 runs and 63 runs, the last attempt going directly to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before ultimately being dismissed lbw by Shorna Akter as she sought to increase the tempo with teammates getting out beside her.

Afterwards in the game, there was also a stumping chance missed and a run-out opportunity lost, even though the latter was a slightly regrettable, with Rubya Haider standing in with the keeping duties following an physical problem to the regular keeper.

Unfortunately for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are nowhere near a one-off. They've dropped 14 chances from a potential 27 at this World Cup and have the lowest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the eight teams.

They are a squad who are generally heading in the proper way – they are competing in merely their second 50-over World Cup ultimately – but poor fielding standards is a obvious issue which demands focus.