It has been quite the resurgence for Costa Rica, who never threw in the towel despite a poor opening seven matches in the Octagon. On Sunday, Luis Fernando Suarez saw his side hang back and defend once again for most of their encounter against El Salvador, but in the end, they got the job done, winning 2-1 and putting themselves in a solid position to keep the possibility of a third successive trip to the finals intact. They come into their final game unbeaten in six straight qualifiers, five of which were victories, and at worst, Los Ticos will find themselves playing in an inter-confederation playoff, regardless of how this match ends up. Costa Rica deserve a ton of credit for the way they came together during a brutal qualifying stretch to turn their campaign around before it was too late. This side may lack creativity and quality in attack, though they make up for it with tremendous poise on the backline and intelligent positional play. The US have won their last four meeting