That's all from this game, folks! Join us back tomorrow as we continue to bring you the LIVE action from around the cricketing world!
Until then, this is Anirudh Modi, signing off along with my colleagues Mohammad Anab, Manan Mehta, and Asraj Khan! See you at the next one.
Hayley Matthews (West Indies Women Captain): "(On her ton) I think I came to know about it this morning itself, pretty nice to get a century today (not having a century vs Sri Lanka). I tried to stay positive. I felt I was in a good space, batting-wise. In the first game, I thought I got unlucky, and in the second match, I was reckless. I tried to take it a bit deeper today, and I am happy it worked out.
(On starting with spin) Two lefties opening the batting for them, we felt like an off-spinner was a good match. We had to find a new new-ball bowler, and the off-spin worked really well. We got early wickets, and that set up the game for us.
(On the win) It is very important, when we play the ICC Championship, Sri Lanka are the team we will be a little closer to in the table. Hopefully, we can carry this momentum forward as a team. It's super important to have someone like Dottin and Stafanie perform in this series. It's really great to have them back in form. When we demonstrate that our players are clicking, we become a tough team to beat.
(On Stafanie Taylor) Stafanie has been a stalwart, someone I have looked up to; I know she is a big legend of the game. Hopefully, she can keep up the good form.
(Upcoming T20I series) We feel like T20 cricket is our best format; we are up and ready for the challenge. It is gonna be competitive, but we want to perform our best."
Chamari Athapaththu (Sri Lanka Women Captain): "(On the defeat) Today she (Hayley) executed her plans really well. She got off to a pretty positive start in the powerplay and scored more than 10 boundaries in the first 15 overs. So that was a big miss for us. But anyway, we have good positive things from this tournament, so we will carry those things into the T20 format.
(On bowling) Actually, I think we bowled a bit too slowly. We needed to bowl a little bit quicker. In the second game, we maintained our pace, variation and angles, but today we did not execute our plans in a positive way. And Hayley played really well.
(On her loss of form) Yeah, I’m a little bit struggling in this tournament. I got good starts in the first and second games, but unfortunately, I couldn’t continue. Hopefully, with the T20s coming up — I love playing this format — I can score some runs in the T20 series. We have to play positive cricket. The World Cup is coming up — we have about three to five months — so we need to execute the right plans. That’s the most important thing. If we start playing positive cricket now, I know we can improve and win more games."
Harshitha Samarawickrama (Player of the Series): "Played my normal game and played on the merit of the ball. That's why got success this time. In previous tours, I was trying to power the ball and not get rhythm.
(On West Indian tracks) Not easy to play on these surfaces where there is a lot of bounce and turn. I had to adjust my batting."
Player of the Series: Harshitha Samarawickrama
Player of the Match: Hayley Matthews
Time for the post-match presentation ceremony..
2:04 AM IST, 4:34 PM Local Time | West Indies Women seal a comprehensive victory over the visitors by 6 wickets! The hosts were able to avoid a whitewash at home, but lose the series 1-2 to Sri Lanka Women.
Sri Lanka Women won the toss and elected to bat first. After losing the wicket of their skipper Chamari Athapaththu for a silver duck, it was Harshitha Samarawickrama's pragmatic innings of 70 runs off 112 balls, and Kavisha Dilhari's crucial and unbeaten knock of 45 runs off 58 balls, that enabled the visitors to establish a competitive total of 217/7 after 50 overs on a turning track.
Hayley Matthews and Karishma Ramharack picked up 2 wickets each to help the cause for the hosts. Afy Fletcher and Ashmini Munisar registered 1 wicket each to round up a successful bowling effort from the West Indies Women.
Come the chase, it was a rocky start for the West Indies Women as Malki Madara removed Qiana Joseph (2) and Shermaine Campbelle early in the powerplay. However, Hayley Matthews and Stafanie Taylor had other ideas as the duo stitched together a match-winning partnership of 124 runs for the 3rd wicket.
In the midst of this partnership, Stafanie Taylor (38) crossed 6,000 runs in WODI cricket and became the second-highest run-scorer ever in this format of the game. Skipper Hayley Matthews achieved a milestone of her own as she scored her maiden WODI century vs Sri Lanka Women, and played an excellent knock of 100 runs off 119 balls to bring her team on the brink of victory.
Chamari Athapaththu removed her counterpart, but it was too little, too late for the visitors as Deandra Dottin (24)* and Chinelle Henry (32)* ensured that their team got over the line with 23 balls to spare in this match.
Malki Madara (2/33) was the pick of the bowlers for Sri Lanka Women, and despite using 7 bowling options, it was not enough to earn them a clean sweep away from home in this series.
All in all, the West Indies Women dominated the game for most of it and in the end came away with a crucial victory to close out the WODI series.