Sri Lanka beats the Bangladeshi side to keep their tournament hopes ongoing
The Lankan team will meet Pakistan in their decisive last tournament encounter
Women's Cricket World Cup, Mumbai
Sri Lanka 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 margin
The Lankan cricket team took four wickets in the final over to seal a heart-stopping win over Bangladesh and keep their faint hopes of making it for the tournament knockout stage intact.
Needing a below-par score of 203 on a favorable wicket in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine more runs from the last six balls.
Nevertheless, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu claimed three crucial wickets in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida to bring about a thrilling victory for the Lankan team.
The victory – the Lankan team's maiden of the World Cup after three losses and two abandoned games against the Australian team and New Zealand – moves them equal on four points with the Indian team and the New Zealand side, who confront each other on Thursday.
Bangladesh, however, endured a fifth consecutive defeat since winning their first match against Pakistan and have been knocked out.
Even though Bangladesh made the excellent commencement, with Marufa striking with the opening bowl of the game to dismiss Gunaratne, they were rightfully punished for a subpar fielding effort.
They gifted reprieves to Hasini Perera, who was dropped three times, and Athapaththu.
Even though the Sri Lankan skipper failed to capitalise, dismissed leg before wicket for 46 one ball after being missed by Rabeya Khan, Hasini Perera made the opposition suffer.
She registered a maiden international half-century, scoring 85 from 99 deliveries and building an important 74-run partnership fifth-wicket association with De Silva.
The Bangladeshi team, guided by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, dragged themselves back into the match, with Nilakshi's wicket in the 34th over triggering a Sri Lanka collapse from 174 for four to 202 complete.
During their chase, Sri Lanka's starting bowlers Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited Bangladesh to 23-1 in a lacklustre opening overs and they were later reduced to 44 for three.
Sharmin Akter and Joty rebuilt their batting effort, adding 82 runs for the fourth wicket before the batter withdrew due to injury for a resolute 64 in the 36th over.
It was leaning toward Bangladesh entering the final two bowling phases, with merely 12 runs required.
Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and gave away merely three scoring runs before the captain's chaos, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida, captain Joty and Marufa all removed as Sri Lanka snatched the triumph at the very end.
Bangladesh cannot maintain composure - and fielding opportunities
In the end, it was a contest of nerves. The seasoned Lankan captain, who ushered away a few of teammates as she prepared to bowl the final over, maintained her nerve. The opposition could not.
There will be many doubts about the team's batting performance. They possibly have been pursuing 270 or 280 with the Lankan team seeming settled on 159 for four in the 30th bowling phase, but rather the chase was much lower.
Nevertheless, the batting side showed little purpose from ball one, scoring at under 2.5 runs each over during the initial phase, suffering a top-order collapse, and finally leaving themselves overwhelming to accomplish.
But no matter what issues there are with their batting, if they had taken their catches in the fielding area, that 203-run target would have been substantially lower.
It required them three tries to terminate the 72-run stand second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana not managing to grab a challenging catch behind the stumps to dismiss Hasini Perera on 23 runs before the captain got a reprieve from a caught and bowled possibility against Rabeya.
The batter was spilled again on 55 runs and 63, the last attempt traveling directly to Rubya Haider Jhilik at cover, before eventually being dismissed leg before wicket by Shorna Akter as she attempted to increase the tempo with teammates being dismissed near her.
Subsequently in the innings, there was also a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, even though the latter was a little unlucky, with Rubya Haider standing in with the gloves after an injury to Joty.
Unfortunately for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are not at all a isolated incident. They've missed 14 opportunities from a possible 27 at this World Cup and boast the worst catching success rate (less than 50%) of the participating teams.
They are a team who are generally heading in the correct path – they are playing in just their second ODI World Cup after all – but poor fielding performance is a obvious issue which needs improvement.
