All the Costa Rica Male National Soccer Team needed was a draw with Honduras today to classify to the Russia 2018 World Cup, however for 95’ minutes it seemed as though the opportunity was slipping away, in a game that was in general boring and where “La Sele” looked out of pace.

Head Coach Oscar Ramírez played it “safe” he maintained the common lineup and played the first 45 minutes with a defensive style.

The first half of the game lacked emotion, “La Sele” looked imprecise and even disinterested, the captain of Costa Rica, Bryan Ruiz is not going through his best moment, and this takes a huge toll on a team that is used to having its rhythm set by its captain.

Honduras managed to gain control of the ball during much of the first half and pressured Costa Rica; they did what they had to do, look for the game and for the opportunity to score since they were obligated to win this game.

The second half came and Costa Rica continued to look less than convincing, disorganized, Ramirez keeping true to his style didn’t make any changes until after the goal was scored by Honduras at minute 66′ (Eddy Hernández).

Once Honduras scored the players of “La H” fell into a defensive style, wasted time, and Costa Rica seemed to be finally looking to control the game as they saw their chance to classify further and further away; the referee declared 6 minutes of additional time to make up for all the lost minutes, and it was at minute 96’ when captain Bryan Ruiz placed an excellent center directly to Kendall Waston’s head who was at the right place at the right time and closed with a perfect definition to tie the score 1-1 and with it sealed Costa Rica’s ticket to the World Cup.

Mexico an Costa Rica are the two teams of the Concacaf group that are now confirmed to be part of Russia 2018.