Curaçao beat Costa Rica 4-3 in the CONCACAF Nations League League A on Thursday evening at their home ground. The visitors took the lead twice in the opening half before the hosts responded, but the Dutch Caribbean side turned things around after the break to claim all three points.
Orlando Sinclair gave Curaçao the advantage in the third minute, and Costa Rica equalised through Carlos Mora twenty minutes later. Mora restored the visitors' lead just before half-time, and by then you could sense the game might still swing. Costa Rica were second to everything in possession, but they had the momentum.
The turning point came after the interval when Curaçao brought on Jürgen Locadia and Orlando Galo Calderon. Kenji Gorre opened his account in the sixty-second minute, and Tahith Chong doubled the visitors' advantage six minutes later. And here's the thing — Costa Rica had created nothing of real quality all evening, zero big chances.
Gorre added his second in the seventy-eighth minute, and Jordi Paulina made it four in the eighty-second. Costa Rica had nothing left to offer, and the yellow cards for Paulina and Leandro Bacuna came as the game was running out. By then the result was beyond doubt.
The statistics tell the fuller story. Curaçao held sixty-three percent possession against thirty-seven, and while both sides registered ten shots, the visitors edged them on target five to four. Costa Rica completed 204 passes and attempted 282, while Curaçao managed 408 successful passes from 473. To be fair, neither side created a single big chance, but the visitors took what they got.
We had backed Costa Rica with seventy-seven percent confidence before kick-off, and the match went another way entirely. What broke it was the lack of cutting edge in the final third when it mattered. The result leaves Costa Rica with a gap to close, and Curaçao with momentum heading into the next fixture.
