Sri Lanka overcomes Bangladesh to preserve their World Cup campaign alive
The Lankan team will face the Pakistani side in their decisive last tournament match
Women's Cricket World Cup, Mumbai
The Lankan team 202 (48.4 overs): Hasini Perera 85 (99); Shorna 3-27
The Bangladeshi team 195-9 (50 overs): Nigar Sultana Joty 77 (98); Chamari Athapaththu 4-42
Sri Lanka emerge victorious by seven runs
The Lankan cricket team secured four wickets in the final over to complete a thrilling win over their opponents and preserve their faint aspirations of qualifying for the tournament knockout stage alive.
Pursuing a modest score of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine runs from the last six balls.
However, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three important dismissals in four balls and Nilakshi de Silva dismissed via run-out Nahida to secure a dramatic victory for Sri Lanka.
The triumph – the Lankan team's initial of the competition after three losses and two abandoned games against the Australian team and the Kiwi side – moves them equal on four match points with India and the New Zealand side, who confront each other on Thursday.
Bangladesh, however, suffered a fifth consecutive setback since securing victory in their tournament opener against the Pakistani team and have been removed from contention.
While Bangladesh got off to the excellent commencement, with Marufa taking a wicket with the initial ball of the match to remove Vishmi Gunaratne, they were appropriately made to pay for a subpar fielding performance.
They offered reprieves to Perera, who was dropped three times, and the Lankan captain.
While Athapaththu could not make it count, dismissed lbw for 46 one ball after being missed by Rabeya, Hasini Perera forced Bangladesh pay.
She achieved a maiden international half-century, scoring 85 from 99 bowls and building an significant 74-run partnership fifth-wicket with Nilakshi de Silva.
The Bangladeshi team, led by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, fought themselves back into the match, with De Silva's removal in the 34th over causing a Lankan downfall from 174 for four to 202 complete.
While batting second, the Lankan team's opening bowlers Malki Madara and Udeshika Prabodhani limited Bangladesh to 23-1 in a lacklustre initial phase and they were afterwards brought down to 44-3.
Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty rebuilt their score, putting on 82 for the fourth wicket stand before Sharmin retired hurt for a stubborn 64 in the 36th bowling phase.
It was in favor of the chasing team entering the final two bowling phases, with just 12 additional runs necessary.
Yet, Dasanayaka removed Ritu and conceded only three runs before Athapaththu's decisive intervention, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa Akter all sent back as the Lankan team grabbed the victory at the very end.
The Bangladeshi team cannot hold nerve - and catches
Finally, it was a contest of nerve. The very experienced Lankan captain, who ushered away a few of fellow players as she set herself to bowl the last over, held her nerve. Bangladesh failed to.
There will be numerous inquiries about the team's batting performance. They might well have been chasing around 270-280 with the Lankan team appearing settled on 159-4 in the 30th innings segment, but in contrast the chase was considerably smaller.
Yet, Bangladesh lacked purpose from ball one, making runs at below 2.5 scoring rate during the initial phase, undergoing a early batting collapse, and finally forcing themselves too much to do.
But whatever problems there are with their batting, if they had taken their chances in the field, that 203-run target would have been significantly lower.
It took them three attempts to break the 72-run second-wicket collaboration, with wicketkeeper Joty failing to take a tough catch as wicketkeeper to remove Perera on 23 before Athapaththu was spared from a caught and bowled opportunity against Rabeya.
Perera was missed further on 55 runs and 63 runs, the last attempt traveling directly to Jhilik at cover, before eventually being given out lbw by Shorna as she attempted to accelerate the scoring with batting partners falling around her.
Afterwards in the innings, there was also a stumping chance missed and a run-out opportunity lost, while the run-out chance was a slightly unfortunate, with Rubya Haider standing in with the keeping duties due to an fitness issue to the regular keeper.
Unfortunately for Bangladesh, such fielding issues are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've failed to catch 14 catches from a potential 27 at this World Cup and have the lowest catching success rate (48.1%) of the eight teams.
They are a squad who are typically progressing in the right direction – they are participating in merely their second ODI World Cup in the end – but substandard fielding standards is a obvious concern which demands improvement.