Costa Rican goalkeeper Keylor Navas He stated this Wednesday that his team cannot lower its guard and must continue to work hard with a view to the playoff against New Zealand next June for a ticket to the World Cup in Qatar 2022.
“We must continue working hard, making an effort, giving it our all. We cannot lower our guard, we did something very difficult and here we are with the illusion of going to the world“, declared the French PSG goalkeeper after Costa Rica’s 2-0 victory over United States at the close of the Concacaf qualifier.
After a poor first round in which Costa Rica only won 6 points in 7 games, the team signed a dream second round and won 19 of the last 21 points and only gave up a tie in their visit to Mexico at the Azteca Stadium.
“We have a very united group and young players who arrived with humility, with desire and dreams to fulfill, who allow themselves to be advised and are aware of the value of being in the national team. That is something good and very nice and if they continue like this they will arrive very far,” Keylor said.
The selector of Costa Ricathe Colombian Luis Fernando Suarezlined up this Wednesday a team of 23 years on average against the United States, with Keylor Navas and defender Kendall Waston as the only veterans, since they decided to protect 8 soccer players who had a yellow card and who would have missed the playoff of receiving one more card .
Navas highlighted the high level of the Costa Rican team in the second round of the octagonal Concacaf and thanked the support of the public in the last home games after enabling the full capacity in the framework of the covid-19 pandemic.
“When people come to the stadium and support us as they have done, it’s beautiful and they even feel like crying and their hearts want to come out. When we’re all united there are more possibilities,” said the goalkeeper.
The three direct tickets to the Concacaf al world they were obtained by Canada (28 points), Mexico (28) and the United States (25), while Costa Rica entered the playoffs with the same 25 points as the Americans but with a worse goal difference.
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