With the ticket to the Qatar 2022 World Cup in his pocket, The Costa Rican team will have to focus in the coming months on fine-tuning its offensive phase, which continues to be the great debt of a team that has based its game on the solidity of a defense commanded by goalkeeper Keylor Navas.
(Be sure to read: Luis Fernando Suárez: the story of a coach celebrating his third World Cup).
The Ticos had only two direct shots in Tuesday’s play-off against New Zealand, but one of them was Joel Campbell’s goal just after 3 minutes. From then on, the Central American team held on to their experienced defensive zone, something similar to what happened in the Concacaf qualifier.
After winning just 6 points in the first 7 games of the Concacaf qualifiers, Costa Rica resurfaced and won 19 of the last 21 points and did not obtain a direct ticket to the World Cup on goal difference with the United States. In those last 7 games, Costa Rica only allowed two goals, largely due to the always outstanding level of French PSG goalkeeper Keylor Navas, who again kept his goal clean on Tuesday in the playoff against New Zealand.
Costa Rica’s coach, Colombian Luis Fernando Suárez, is aware that his team needs to raise the level to compete in Group E of the Qatar 2022 World Cup, which it shares with Japan and two world champions: Germany and Spain. “All the games are going to be difficult, complicated. If we want to be protagonists in the World Cup and in the group that touched us, first we have to improve a lot. What the group did was qualify clinging to something that was important and that they did quite well , which was the defensive part”, declared Suárez in the press conference after qualifying.
The coach described Group E as “nice” and hopes to achieve the best preparation of the team in the remaining months for the World Cup.
EFE
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