The Lankan team beats the Bangladeshi side to maintain their World Cup tournament hopes alive
The Lankan team will face Pakistan in their decisive final tournament 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): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Athapaththu 4-42
Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs
The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the decisive innings segment to complete a thrilling win over their opponents and keep their slim hopes of making it for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.
Needing a modest score of 203 on a favorable wicket in the Mumbai stadium, Bangladesh wanted nine runs from the last six deliveries.
Nevertheless, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three important dismissals in four bowls and de Silva ran out Nahida to secure a thrilling victory for Sri Lanka.
The triumph – the Lankan team's maiden of the World Cup after three unsuccessful matches and two abandoned games against Australia and New Zealand – moves them tied on four tournament points with the Indian team and New Zealand, who face each other on Thursday.
The Bangladeshi team, on the other hand, experienced a fifth consecutive loss since securing victory in their initial game against the Pakistani team and have been eliminated.
Even though Bangladesh made the ideal beginning, with Marufa taking a wicket with the initial ball of the encounter to send back Gunaratne, they were deservedly punished for a subpar fielding display.
They gifted lifelines to Hasini Perera, who was missed three times, and Athapaththu.
Although Athapaththu could not make it count, sent back lbw for 46 just one delivery after being put down by Rabeya Khan, Perera made Bangladesh regret it.
She scored a first international 50-run score, accumulating 85 from 99 deliveries and building an important 74-run fifth-wicket collaboration with De Silva.
The Bangladeshi team, led by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, fought themselves back in the match, with Nilakshi's dismissal in the 34th innings segment triggering a Lankan collapse from 174 with four wickets down to 202 complete.
In reply, Sri Lanka's initial pace attack Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited the opposition to 23 for one in a uninspiring opening overs and they were later brought down to 44 for three.
Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their innings, putting on an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket before the batter withdrew due to injury for a stubborn 64 in the 36th innings segment.
It was in favor of the chasing team entering the remaining two innings segments, with only 12 additional runs needed.
Nevertheless, Sugandika Dasanayaka sent back Ritu and allowed merely three scoring runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya, Nahida, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all dismissed as Sri Lanka snatched the victory at the final moment.
The Bangladeshi team cannot maintain composure - and fielding opportunities
Finally, it was a match of composure. The highly experienced Athapaththu, who moved aside a few of team-mates as she set herself to deliver the final over, maintained hers. The opposition failed to.
There will be many questions about Bangladesh's batting display. They might well have been chasing around 270-280 with Sri Lanka looking settled on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th over, but instead the target was much lower.
Yet, the batting side lacked aggression from the start, making runs at below 2.5 scoring rate during the initial phase, undergoing a early batting collapse, and eventually leaving themselves excessive to achieve.
But no matter what problems there are with their batting lineup, if they had taken their opportunities in the fielding department, that 203 total goal would have been significantly smaller.
It took them three attempts to terminate the 72-run second-wicket collaboration, with keeper Joty being unable to take a challenging chance as wicketkeeper to remove Hasini Perera on 23 before Athapaththu got a reprieve from a return catch opportunity against Rabeya.
The batter was missed further on 55 runs and 63 runs, the last attempt traveling directly to Jhilik at cover, before finally being trapped lbw by Shorna Akter as she tried to increase the tempo with teammates getting out near her.
Subsequently in the game, there was furthermore a stumping chance missed and a missed run-out, even though the latter was a somewhat regrettable, with Rubya Haider substituting with the gloves due to an fitness issue to the regular keeper.
Sadly for the team, such fielding woes are far from a single occurrence. They've missed 14 catches from a potential 27 opportunities at this tournament and display the poorest catch efficiency (less than 50%) of the competing sides.
They are a squad who are generally moving in the right direction – they are participating in merely their second 50-over World Cup after all – but inadequate fielding standards is a obvious concern which demands improvement.
