Costa Rica Held to 0-0 Draw Against Guatemala in Nations League

Guatemala and Costa Rica played out a drab goalless draw in Guatemala City on Monday night. In front of a fervent home crowd, the contest sadly did not mirror the spectators, and was marred by a substandard pitch.

In team news, interim coach Claudio Vivas made four changes from last week’s 3-0 victory over Guadeloupe, with Gerald Taylor, Sebastián Acuña, Warren Madrigal, and Manfred Ugalde deputizing for Haxzel Quirós, Alejandro Bran, Josimar Alcócer, and Alonso Martínez. A special shoutout to Sebastián Acuña, who earned his first competitive appearance for Los Ticos!

First Half

The opening quarter was a cagey affair, with both sides finding the unpredictable nature of the shoddy surface problematic. On the half-hour mark, the match saw its first real piece of action, when Guatemala winger Oscar Santis was put through one-on-one with just keeper Patrick Sequeira to beat, only for captain Francisco Calvo to intercept with a heroic last-ditch challenge. But that was the highlight of a disappointing half of football.

Second Half

The second half started in the same vein, with neither nation able to get a grip of proceedings. In the 65th minute, the home side thought they scored through Santis, but it was rightly called offside. However, minutes they should really have opened the scoring when Pedro Altán shot straight at Sequeira from just 9 yards out, as the hosts started to take control. But sadly, after that little flurry, the tie tamely drifted to a draw.

Overall, it was an insipid game that should be shown to people suffering from insomnia; we can take positivity in gaining another clean sheet, and the backline did look impressive throughout, in addition to the point meaning Costa Rica stay top of the Nations League group, but the less we talk about this game and move on, the better!                                         

Here are my players ratings:

1) Patrick Sequeira – 8/10

3) Jeyland Mitchell – 8/10

4) Juan Pablo Vargas – 8/10

15) Francisco Calvo (C) – 8.5/10 (MOTM)

2) Gerald Taylor – 3.5/10

13) Jefferson Brenes – 5/10

19) Sebastián Acuña – 3.5/10

11) Ariel Lassiter – 3.5/10

12) Joel Campbell – 4/10

9) Manfred Ugalde – 4/10

17) Warren Madrigal – 5.5/10

Substitutes

20) Josimar Alcócer (for Joel Campbell 63rd minute) – 4/10

22) Rónald Matarrita (for Ariel Lassiter 72nd minute) – 5/10

7) Andy Rojas (for Warren Madrigal 72nd minute) – 4/10

5) Fernán Faerrón (for Gerald Taylor 78th minute) – N/A

14) Alejandro Bran (for Sebastián Acuña 78th minute) – N/A

Coach

Claudio Vivas- 3/10

He heavily damaged his chances of getting the role full-time. Monotonous tactics reminiscent of the dark days of Luis Fernando Suárez. Poor line-up, such as selecting Acuña out of nowhere (who was markedly out of his depth), and an aging Campbell who has shown under Alfaro that he is far more effective from the bench, and further condemned by his sluggish anduninspired substitutions throughout the contest. His negative game plan made a spirited yet distinctly average Guatemala look good and even boss the match with 56% of the possession. An indefensible statistic for a nation ranked 58 places below La Sele.

Let’s hope for a better performance next time out, when Costa Rica head to north-eastern coast of South America to face Suriname on the 11th of October.