Sri Lanka defeats Bangladesh to keep their campaign ongoing
The Lankan team will meet the Pakistani side in their decisive final group game
ICC Women's World Cup, Mumbai
The Lankan team 202 (48.4 overs): Perera 85 (99); Shorna 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 secured four wickets in the last innings segment to achieve a thrilling triumph over Bangladesh and preserve their narrow aspirations of making it for the World Cup semi-finals ongoing.
Pursuing a below-par score of 203 on a batting-friendly pitch in the Mumbai stadium, the Bangladeshi team wanted nine runs from the last six bowls.
Nevertheless, Lankan skipper Athapaththu took three crucial wickets in four deliveries and de Silva ran out Nahida to secure a exciting win for Sri Lanka.
The win – the Lankan team's maiden of the World Cup after three losses and two no-results against the Australian team and New Zealand – pushes them level on four match points with India and New Zealand, who meet each other on the coming Thursday.
Bangladesh, on the other hand, endured a fifth straight defeat since securing victory in their first match against the Pakistani team and have been knocked out.
While Bangladesh got off to the ideal beginning, with Marufa taking a wicket with the opening bowl of the game to remove Gunaratne, they were appropriately punished for a poor fielding effort.
They offered reprieves to Perera, who was spilled multiple times, and the Lankan captain.
Even though Athapaththu failed to make it count, dismissed lbw for 46 just one delivery after being dropped by Rabeya Khan, Perera made the opposition pay.
She registered a debut international fifty, making 85 from 99 deliveries and building an crucial 74-run fifth-wicket with Nilakshi de Silva.
The Bangladeshi team, spearheaded by Shorna Akter's three wickets for 27 runs, fought themselves back in the game, with Nilakshi's wicket in the 34th bowling segment initiating a Sri Lanka collapse from 174-4 to 202 total.
During their chase, Sri Lanka's opening bowlers Madara and Prabodhani contained Bangladesh to 23-1 in a uninspiring opening overs and they were later reduced to 44 for three.
Sharmin Akter and Nigar Sultana Joty reconstructed their batting effort, adding an 82-run partnership for the fourth wicket stand before Sharmin left the field injured for a determined 64 in the 36th innings segment.
It was leaning toward the chasing team approaching the final two overs, with just 12 runs required.
Yet, Sugandika Dasanayaka removed Ritu and gave away only three runs before Athapaththu's dramatic spell, with Rabeya Khan, Nahida Akter, skipper Joty and Marufa all dismissed as Sri Lanka grabbed the win at the very end.
The Bangladeshi team cannot keep calm - and catches
In the end, it was a match of nerves. The seasoned Athapaththu, who ushered away a few of fellow players as she set herself to deliver the final over, kept hers. The opposition did not.
There will be many inquiries about the team's batting performance. They might well have been chasing 270 or 280 with Sri Lanka appearing comfortable on 159 with four wickets down in the 30th innings segment, but rather the chase was considerably smaller.
Yet, Bangladesh lacked aggression from ball one, accumulating runs at under 2.5 scoring rate during the opening overs, suffering a initial wicket loss, and ultimately making themselves too much to do.
But whatever difficulties there are with their batting, if they had taken their catches in the fielding area, that 203 total goal would have been considerably smaller.
It required them three attempts to break the 72-run stand second-wicket association, with wicketkeeper Nigar Sultana being unable to grab a challenging opportunity as wicketkeeper to dismiss Hasini Perera on her score of 23 before Athapaththu survived from a caught and bowled chance opportunity against Rabeya.
Perera was dropped further on 55 and 63, the final opportunity flying right to Jhilik at cover field, before eventually being given out lbw by Shorna as she tried to increase the tempo with partners getting out beside her.
Subsequently in the game, there was additionally a failed stumping and a failed run-out, even though the second one was a somewhat regrettable, with Jhilik standing in with the keeping duties after an injury to the regular keeper.
Sadly for Bangladesh, such fielding problems are nowhere near a isolated incident. They've dropped 14 chances from a potential 27 opportunities at this tournament and boast the poorest catching success rate (48.1 percent) of the competing sides.
They are a team who are overall progressing in the proper way – they are competing in just their second one-day World Cup after all – but substandard fielding standards is a prominent problem which demands improvement.
